Easy Target
by writergirl128
Summary: Dash tries to decode the mystery that is Danny Fenton, and gets in a little over his head.
1. Prologue

It wasn't until senior year that Danny Fenton started to _change._

All throughout high school, he'd been the scrawny, kind of lanky pasty kid with the weird family. His attendance was trash, and his grades were worse. It seemed like he only really had two friends, the nerd boy Tucker and the spooky goth chick Sam. He was such an easy target, it was almost as if he sent out a personal ad to be bullied.

Sometime when they were sophomores, he started ditching his standard white and red t-shirt in favor of a long sleeved red shirt. Rumors floated around that he was going all emo goth on them—cutting, and using the shirts to hide the scars. Dash wasn't sure if he'd believe that. Fenton didn't seem the type. Then again, he did seem to get… _darker_ , the older he got. Sometimes the light would catch his eyes just right, and Dash swore, they were the eyes of a war veteran. Someone who'd seen more pain and darkness in a single lifetime than most others combined. The moment would pass, of course, and he'd be his smartass, sarcastic self, levity in his voice and person. But it was definitely there.

Junior year, he started showing up to school with injuries. He had a deep scratch, starting at his cheekbone and disappearing down the collar of his shirt on picture day. No one had the nerve to ask what it was from. The week after that, people started talking—why _was_ it, exactly, that Fenton waited until after the bell to change after gym? It easily cut his lunchtime in half. During spirit week, he sported a black eye, and on the last day of school, he darted out in the middle of Lancer's final, despite the way he'd been limping all week, and didn't show up again all day. Dash heard he had a week's worth of summer detention to make it up.

Despite whatever weirdness was going on with him, he took his still regular pummelings like a champ—as smartmouthed and wise-cracking as ever. Dash almost felt bad, like maybe he should pick a new, less damaged target. But then Fenton was arguably the freakiest, weakest, _weirdest_ kid in the school, and put it all together? It was too good for Dash to pass on. The little dweeb had it coming.

Then senior year started. Dash realized in a huff that suddenly, he had to pull the little nerd _down_ to look him square in the eyes as he wailed on him. He had Fenton pinned up against the lockers, like he always did, and Fenton didn't fight back, Fenton _never_ fought back, but maybe—no, definitely, Dash realized while a lump formed in his throat. He _definitely_ could fight back. His shoulders were almost as broad as Dash's own, his chest a little leaner than Dash's, but hard, solid muscle, if the way the tightness behind his fists was any indication as he grabbed fistfuls of the kid's shirt. His arms looked like he'd been wrestling with alligators—lean, but solid, and _strong_ in a way that almost intimidated Dash. He had a good two inches over Dash, yet even then, he allowed the other boy to toss him around like he was no more than the lanky wimp he'd always been.

Dear God, what had _happened_ to him? Granted, with that giant oaf of a father, it wasn't that farfetched that Fenturd would grow into a larger frame. But this?

He was still as chummy as ever with Manson and Foley—he'd even seen him hang out with Valerie Gray, once and a while. As far as Dash could tell, he was as infuriatingly lighthearted as ever, even though sometimes he walked into school with a limp, or a sling on his shoulder. He was the same over confident little bastard as ever, making bad puns and lame excuses, only now they were coming from a person who looked like they'd taken on a freaking army and won. Sometimes when Dash had him cornered, his mouth would pull up into a sly little smile, almost as if he just wanted to laugh.

Rumors floated around as to _what_ he had gotten himself into. There must be some explanation for all of it, right? At first, people thought maybe the kid was abused at home. That would explain some of the injuries, even the supposed "cutting", the darker humor in his eyes. Wouldn't quite explain the consistent absences, though. Besides that, as soon as the rumor became popular, people realized how impossible it would be—Jack and Maddie Fenton, as crazy as they were about fighting ghosts, were known to be arguably the most kind-hearted adults in the town. Whenever there were ghost attacks, ghost invasions—which happened a lot more frequently than anyone liked—they were always the first to open their house to the general public to get them to safety. They installed ghost shields in almost every public facility, and one in the hospital that would run off of outside energy were they ever to experience a blackout. They upgraded the police with ecto-weapons, wanting to take every precaution to protect their town. They once sent out a city-wide search for their son when he was an hour late for curfew.

It was impossible. The Fentons weren't _capable_ of being abusive, let alone so abusive that their son would show up to school so hurt all the time.

The next and most probable theory was that Fenton somehow got involved in ghost hunting. Joined in on the family business, or whatever. But that didn't make much sense to Dash—because as soon as a ghost came within a five mile radius of the kid, Fenton would practically wet his pants and run into hiding. It happened every time, without fail. For living in a place that was donned the title "The Most Haunted Town in the World", that kid was as skittish around ghosts as a cat in a doghouse.

And suppose the nerd _did_ take up ghost fighting. How come his parents, who were the experts, were never that beat up? How come they always seemed to be perfectly fine, and healthy, whenever he saw them out? It didn't add up. Not to mention that he wasn't sure they'd ever let their son continue doing something that he got that hurt that frequently to do. They'd never allow it.

Something wasn't right. Of course, nobody had the guts to ask Fenton about it straight out. No, his hands were rough with callouses, and his chest was broad and strong, and his arms looked like he spent his free time fighting off monsters, and no one besides Dash and his crew dared to roughhouse him, anymore. Even Paulina, who used to scoff and laugh when he had a crush on her, would follow him with her eyes as he moved, something almost predatory lurking in them—the way she used to look at Dash. Dash figured, can't let him get too comfortable, right? Someone's gotta put him in his place.

That didn't mean he wasn't insanely curious. While pretty much everyone in their class knew Fenton could take him in a fight, just by sizing the two up next to each other, he still let Dash wail on him every other day for no apparent, actual reason. Why would he let him do that? What had given him that dark, world-weary look in his eyes? That sly, knowing smile? That air of "come on, give me your best shot"?

Dash didn't know, but he was sure as hell going to find out.


	2. Chapter 2

" _Beware!"_

Danny resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Oh, you've gotta be kidding me." He tapped the Fenton Phone in his ear, putting the talkback on. "False alarm, guys, it's just the Box Ghost. Go on inside, I'll be back in a sec."

" _I am the Box Ghost! Prepare yourself for the pain of your corrugated cardboard DOOM!"_

"Yeah, sure. Hey, Boxy—I was trying to have a movie night with my friends. Do you think we could skip the part with the fighting and go straight to the part where I suck you into the Fenton Thermos? I kinda promised my friends a ghost-free night, and, well…"

" _You will never catch me, Ghost Child! I am the Box Ghost! Feel my wrath!"_

Danny rolled his eyes, shooting an ectoblast towards the blue figure, sending him flying backwards. "You sure you wanna do that?" he asked, pulling a Fenton Thermos from his belt with one hand, excited green energy dancing around the fingers on his other.

For a moment, the Box Ghost blinked at him, all four-foot-something of him floating backwards a little bit. "I've changed my mind! There will be no Thermos sucking today—for I am the Box Ghost! And I will allow you to live another day!"

Danny raised his eyebrows. "Greatly appreciated. Now don't go causing any trouble," he said, and waved the Thermos that was in his hands, "got it?"

The Box Ghost agreed, grumbling something Danny couldn't quite catch, before flying off towards the warehouse Danny knew he inhabited. Chuckling, he turned and raced back towards the movie theater, phasing through the ceiling invisibly and retreating into a stall in the bathroom before changing back.

Twin silver rings of light encircled him, as a familiar chill passed over his body, turning black jumpsuit into jeans and a red long sleeved shirt, turning white hair raven-black, turning electric green eyes ice blue. Exiting the stall, he checked to see if there was anyone else there. Content that there wasn't, he turned to the mirror, lifting his shirt.

His body was littered with scars and bruises. Sometimes the bruises were small—shot by one of Skulker's lasers, a punch to the gut, whatever. Other times they could be the size of a bowling ball—ecto-blasts to the back, falling thirty feet to the sidewalk, crashing into buildings at hundreds of miles an hour. These were all fine, normal to him even, by now. No, that's not what he was looking for.

Turning slightly, the angry looking cross patterned wounds were raw on his skin—leftover from a particularly nasty run in with Freakshow the day before, after he got away from the Guys in White…again. It was one of Lydia's tattoos that had done it—had found an open wound and buried under his skin, before clawing it's way through flesh and to the surface. The wounds were closed, but they were still tight when he moved, sending sharp, stinging pains all the way up and down his back if he shifted the wrong way or moved too quickly. The gashes were surrounded by purpling skin, making the majority of his back look like one giant bruise.

Sighing he dropped his shirt back down, as he heard voices approaching the bathroom. He flipped the faucet on, pushing his sleeves up to his elbows to wash his hands, pretend like he was doing what every other normal person does in the bathroom. He'd grown to love long sleeves, because while he never got cold anymore thanks to his ice powers, they were normal enough to wear regularly and hid his scars brilliantly. There's nothing worse than getting caught and interrogated by the football jocks about something they knew nothing about.

The men passed behind him without even a second glance towards him, and Danny smirked as he turned the water off and went to dry his hands. It was pretty cool, having the ability to be totally invisible even when you were actually 100% visible. Danny knew he wasn't exactly small, anymore—he'd shot up over the summer, easily two or three inches over even Dash Baxter, and he'd filled out a little. He hadn't buffed out to the point that the evil version of himself from the future had, and he honestly didn't want to. But the ghost hunting started to show, and his arms got bigger and his shoulders broadened and somewhere along the way he'd ditched the overly baggy clothes and started wearing things that fit him better.

Still, despite the way he'd filled out over the past few years, he still was able to make himself small and insignificant and practically invisible to people who didn't know who he was, what he had been.

The kids at school, though…well that was a whole different story.

He dug his already ripped movie stub out of the pocket of his jeans as he approached the kid manning the box office. He seemed young, a freshman or sophomore, maybe. He looked at Danny oddly, as he handed the stub over, the same kind of way someone would look at, say, a dolphin rollerblading, or a donkey tap dancing. The kid handed Danny's stub back, nodding him in but still eyeing him wearily, and Danny rolled his eyes.

Yeah, a lot had changed since freshman year.

He shook his head silently as he headed into the theater—all weekend long, they had a _Dead Teacher_ marathon running, and Tucker, Sam and he couldn't miss it. Even if it became just mindless violence somewhere around the eighth volume, it was their favorite series. Danny even went triple overtime on his patrol the night before, to try and assure he could give his best friends the ghost-free weekend that they deserved.

It was the least he could do for them, after all that they'd done for him.

Though the theater was dark, Danny didn't have a problem finding his best friends among the crowd—they'd purposefully stayed close to the back and on the end of the aisle just in case they had to leave unexpectedly somewhere down the line. Danny slid into the end seat silently, and Sam looked over quickly before interlacing her fingers between his on the armrest that they shared, giving him a small smile.

They got through the end of the movie without incident. Tucker chomped away on his popcorn and Sam settled into the chair in content, and Danny—well Danny was thrilled they got to focus on something that had absolutely nothing to do with ghosts. There was a half hour break between this and the next movie, and as they rounded the corner to the concessions counter, they ran face first into none other than Dash Baxter, flanked by Kwan and some other football meathead Danny really didn't care about enough to know. He was a regular, though—one of the ones who continuously helped Dash in his violent endeavors.

Danny winced as Dash tried to make himself seem bigger. "Watch it, Fentina," he growled, despite having to look up slightly to look Danny in the eyes. It was kinda funny—freshman year, Dash had seemed so big to him. Realistically, he and Tucker were just really short for their age. For a while, at least. Time and ghost hunting paid its dues to Tuck as well—he wasn't as tall as Danny was, but he was about the same height as Dash, maybe a tad shorter, and far less gangly. He still had his PDA glued to his hands and a borderline unhealthy reliance on meat and technology, though. Danny wasn't sure that would ever go away.

He blinked at Dash, then, taking in the way he kind of held his chest out—trying to _assert his dominance_ , or something. Danny played along, taking a step away from the jock. "I guess I wasn't paying attention," he feigned, meekly. "My bad."

Taking the bait, Dash grabbed for the front of Danny's shirt, jerking him forward, and Danny couldn't help but wince as the action pulled painfully at the wounds on his back. Thinking Danny winced in fear of him or something equally as pathetic, Dash grinned triumphantly. "You got that right, dweeb. It is _your bad._ "

Danny sighed, shaking his head. "What are you even doing here, anyways, Dash? Weren't these the movies you always made fun of us for liking?"

Dash's eyes narrowed at the accusation, and Danny couldn't quite read them. What he could read, though, was his body language—the way Dash's fist tightened over the cloth of his red shirt, as he pulled the man closer, almost as if to shake him. Dany winced again, pain shooting through his back. The way Dash had grabbed him, he knew plenty of ways to get out—with or without hurting Dash in the process. One hand over Dash's fist, holding it steady, the other forcing his bent elbow up higher, the sudden impact triggering a popping sound in the attacker's shoulder…

But it wasn't an attacker. It was just Dash. So Danny did nothing.

Dash sighed, releasing his hold on Danny's shirt. "I'm here for a friend, loser. I'm keeping an eye on someone."

That only sounded mildly perverted and predatory. Still, Danny fought a shiver—and lost. A second later, he realized why, and his fists curled at his sides, a chill of air escaping his mouth as he felt a familiar cold pull in his core.

Thankfully Dash and his goons were kind of dim—they didn't even notice how for a split second, Danny's breath was as visible as if they were standing outside in 18 degree weather, despite the movie theater's cozy heating. His fists tightened a little more, as he straightened up to face Dash. "Well this was an awesome little chat, Dash, but we gotta go." And he turned to walk away.

Of course, it could never be that easy. "Where do you think you're going, Fenturd?" Dash called after him, and then there was a hand on his shoulders, turning him back around.

"Uh—maybe going back to watch the movie?" Tucker said, sarcasm dripping off of the words as he raised an eyebrow. "You know, that's kinda what happens in movie theaters."

Dash's eyebrows drew together in disbelief, and he turned to see the clock hanging on the other side of the room. When he turned back, his eyes glinted in satisfaction. "No way. The next movie doesn't even start for twenty-five more minutes."

"We want to make sure we get good seats," Sam interrupted. "Last time we got the nosebleed seats. Not fun."

Dash looked at them suspiciously, but didn't make a move or open his mouth to say anything. Grateful, Danny and his friends returned to the theater, painfully slowly so they wouldn't look suspicious of anything.

"It's probably nothing," Danny told them, once they'd entered the now empty amphitheater. "Probably just the Box Ghost causing trouble again or something." They made their way a little farther into the theater than before, so not to be overheard.

Sam crossed her arms over her chest, arching a single eyebrow at him. Despite the fact that she was significantly shorter than he was, she still knew how to make him feel small, make him squirm. "Danny, you know, we really don't mind—"

"Quit it, no, shush. Ghost-free weekend, remember?"

Now it was Tucker's turn to raise his eyebrows. "Well by that logic, we shouldn't even be hanging out with you."

Danny rolled his eyes, tugging on the coldness in his chest, triggering the twin silver rings. "Ha ha," he mocked as he changed, "so funny. You know what I mean." He fished his Fenton Phone out of his bag and wrapped it around his ear, sticking the half-full Fenton Thermos in his belt as he shot his best friends a grin. "I'll be right back."

"Danny, I don't know…" Sam bit her lip.

"Sam, it'll be fine."

"Are you sure you don't want back—"

"Positive," he cut her off, flying up towards the ceiling, but pausing just before phasing through it. "I would love some popcorn though," he decided with a grin, earning him a glare from Sam and a chuckle from Tucker, before phasing through the ceiling and plunging deep into the night sky.

He looked around, not knowing what to expect—his Ghost Sense had gone off, but…there didn't seem to be any ghosts. That was weird. He decided to do a quick scope of the area before heading back inside. Sweeping high, just above the trees that surrounded the theater parking lot, his Ghost Sense went off again. He slowed to a stop, peering through the trees, and still, he saw nothing.

Suddenly, a blast like twenty knives rammed into his already injured back, and Danny found himself hurtling towards the ground at unimaginable speeds. Stars dancing in his vision, he was in too much pain to think clearly—as he raced towards the concrete parking lot, there was only one, truly coherent thought going through his mind. He tried to slow his momentum, cushion his fall, but…god, the ground was getting so close so quickly…

 _Aw, crud. This is gonna hurt._

Then his body exploded with pain, and everything went black.


	3. Chapter 3

It was a split second decision, and probably one he wouldn't be proud of if he looked back on it years from now…but Dash had to _know._ He had to figure this kid out. It just didn't make sense. Dash knew he was a lot of things, but he wasn't as stupid as everyone assumed. Fenton and his loser friends had come out of the theater, towards the concessions counter, and run into them. Then, after, they insisted on going back into the theater, without even buying anything?

There was no option, not really. He had to follow them.

He waved off Kwan and Powolski, sending them to go find some nerd or another—God knows there was plenty around this geek-powered-moviethon. The only reason he'd come in the first place was to keep tabs on Fenton, try and figure out what the hell was going on with him. Not that he was proud of spying, he just knew it was the only way to find the truth. So, when Fenton, Foley, and Manson turned and made their way back to their seats, Dash knew what he had to do.

He stayed far enough behind them that they wouldn't hear his footsteps falling as he followed them, but close enough that he could get slivers of sentences, snippets of the conversation. When they made it back to the theater, he waited a moment, lingering farther away, as he noticed Fenton looking around, as if checking to see if there was anyone else there.

Seemingly content that the theater was empty, Fenton drew both of them across the doorway and down to about the middle row seats. Dash followed behind, wincing as some abandoned pieces of popcorn crunched under his foot. Luckily, they seemed absorbed in their own conversation, so they didn't hear him slip in near the back of the auditorium, creeping down the aisle so that he was only a few rows behind them. The theater, thankfully, was dark enough to conceal him in shadows. Still, he hunkered down low, straining his ears, as the three shadow-like figures in front of him conversed.

"… _We really don't mind…"_ he heard the gloomy chick's voice say.

 _"_ _Quit it, no, shush. Ghost-free weekend, remember?"_ That was definitely Fenton. So it _was_ ghost fighting, after all. Huh. Not entirely surprising, even though he wasn't sure he'd even ever seen Fenton in the same room as a ghost.

 _"…_ _shouldn't even be hanging out with you…"_ And that was Foley. What he meant by that, Dash had no clue, but Fenton seemed to find it amusing, if his chuckle meant anything.

" _Ha ha,"_ Fenton's voice said, then, before a flash of white light illuminated the theater. Dash squinted against the sudden brightness, instinctually hunkering down lower into his hiding spot to remain hidden. But as the odd light faded, a new one replaced it. This one was a faint, soft glow almost, encasing a tall, well-built figure, offering slightly silvery illumination in the darkness of the theater that felt a few degrees colder than it had seconds ago. Dash had to bite down on his tongue when the figure turned slightly, and he caught a glimpse of brightly glowing electric green eyes.

What the _hell_ was going on?

As the figure shifted slightly, the green, ghostly glow of his eyes reflected off of his own person at just the right angle for Dash to make out the white logo on his chest. He blinked, something like fear clenching in his stomach, but also…awe. Because if he didn't know any better, that was _Danny Fucking Phantom,_ over there, and man, that guy had been Dash's idol for years.

Wait a sec. Does that mean that Fenton and his loser friends _knew_ Phantom? That they worked with him? It sure would explain a lot—the injuries, the tardiness, the fact that the three of them were practically glued together at the hips. This must've been it. This is why Fenton's been so strange, why they've been so weird lately, ever since Phantom showed up. They knew him. They _helped him._

It almost made him feel bad about wailing on them all the time. Almost.

Blinking, he snapped back to reality, kicking himself as he realized he'd missed the rest of the conversation. The room had reverted to it's normal, dark lighting, a sure sign that Phantom had already gone off to fight whatever it seemed like decided to poke it's head out in public tonight. There were two shadow-figures left, who sank down into the seats they were near. One of the figures was smaller, short and willowy, while the other was tall and lanky—Manson and Foley, then. Where'd Fenton go?

Then it hit him—he must've left to go help Phantom. That _must_ be why he was so beat up all the time, why he, more than the others, always was in the worse shape. He fought with Phantom. It was the only explanation.

But where'd they go? Phantom must've flied them out through the ceiling, or something. Man, that was cool. Dash couldn't help but wonder how, exactly, Fenton got so involved in ghost fighting—let alone, fighting alongside a ghost. His parents were ghost hunters, for crying out loud. What would they think if they knew what their son was up to? That he was helping the very things they sought to destroy?

It was enough to make his head spin. Freshman year, there always was an eeriness to the way that Phantom would show up wherever Fenton seemed to be. Dash always just figured that the ghost had some bizarre obsession, or something—that was what ghost's life energies were based off of, anyways, right? Obsessions? Technology, hunting, boxes…even if Dash had never been directly involved with ghosts, you don't live in Amity Park without learning a few things about ghosts along the way. It came with the territory. Literally.

Despite that, though, Dash was ashamed to admit that he'd never had the guts or bravery to fight the ghosts that plagued their city. The only time he really got involved with them was when…was when he and Phantom were shrunken down and hunted by that robot ghost dude, Skulker. He started making connections in his head— _this_ was why Phantom knew so much about the Fentons, and their inventions. Had he been working with that little dweeb this whole time?

Dash had to see it to believe it.

As silently as he could, Dash retreated from his hiding spot, creeping back down the aisle and out the door to the auditorium. He turned to the back door of the theater, looking over to see Kwan and Powolski shaking some freshman free of his candy, before shouldering his way out the door, bracing himself against the cold, winter winds.

Phantom had to be out here, somewhere. And if he was out here, that means Fenton couldn't be far behind. At least, if Dash's theories were correct.

His eyes scanned the sky for a moment only before landing on a hovering, slightly glowing silvery figure, floating easily a good seventy or eighty feet in the air. Dash felt a grin stretch across his face as he watched—but in an instant, that grin dropped like a bowling ball off of the roof of a building. Because something was approaching him.

Dash opened his mouth to call out a warning to Phantom, but he was too late—bright pink shards of ecto energy sliced into Phantom's back, pushing him away from the trees and crackling around him like fireworks. Phantom screamed at the impact, as the force from it sent him plummeting towards the solid concrete below.

 _Go intangible, for the love of god,_ Dash thought to himself, at a loss of what to do. There was no way to help him. If he tried to catch the ghost, he'd undoubtedly get crushed along the way. And unless Phantom phased through the concrete, the fall might seriously break every single bone in his body. Then again, he was already dead, wasn't he? So then…what was that look of absolute terror in his eyes as he sped towards the ground? Why wasn't he…why wasn't he trying to save himself?

Unless—oh God. He must be hurt. Badly, too if it meant he didn't have enough energy to concentrate on even saving himself. He had to do something. But what? What could he possibly do? Dash looked back up at his idol, noticing how now, it seemed like his fall was slowing. He still rapidly approached the ground, but less rapidly now. Far less damage, Dash could tell, just by observing. Maybe a couple of broken bones, but nothing like what it would've been. Do ghosts have bones to break?

 _Where the hell was Fenton?_ Isn't he supposed to be helping Phantom out with all of this? Shouldn't he be there, ready to help? Unless Dash got it wrong. Even though he was pretty sure he wasn't. Looking behind him, towards the theater, Dash was even more sure of himself when he saw Fenton's backpack lying haphazardly on the sidewalk, some contents spilling out. He ran to it, rummaging through until he found something that resembled a soup thermos.

He'd definitely seen Phantom use these before. It caught the ghosts, sucked them up into some little vortex, or something. He wasn't sure, and he didn't really have time to debate it when he heard the inevitable _thud_ from behind him that sounded almost more like a _crackle schplurge._ Shuddering, Dash ditched the backpack and ran over to where Phantom had, finally, fallen.

Someone laughed from behind him, a ghost he vaguely recognized—blue tinted skin and red eyes, this regal-looking-vampire-esque cape hanging off of his shoulders. Dash whirled on his feet, fumbling with the thermos in his hands to take the lid off. _Goddammit, I don't know how to_ use _this thing…_

The ghost laughed at him, this time, rather than at Phantom, shaking his head as angry looking electric pink energy danced around his hands. "Mr. Baxter, surely you know better than to try and use that stupidity on me, right?"

Dash froze at his own name, not understanding how the ghost knew who he was. Then the ghost closed it's eyes, shaking its head, and Dash took his chance. He uncapped the thermos, and in that same instant, pointed it towards the ghost.

Immediately, the thermos practically clicked to life, shooting a bright blue beam of energy out of the top with a whir. The ghost's eyes widened, and began to fizzle out of view, like he was trying to transport himself away, but it was too late. He was caught in the beam, and the next second later, he was gone, trapped inside a stupid looking soup container.

Dash put the lid back on, not entirely sure of what just happened, before drawing his attention back down the Phantom. He looked bad. Not only that, but he was _unconscious._ Dash had to get him out of there. Part of him hoped Fenton would suddenly turn up to help him, because he had absolutely no idea how to take care of _ghost injuries._ But Fenton was nowhere to be seen.

Maybe he was just a scaredy-cat after all.

Dash ran to retrieve the forgotten backpack, shoving the thermos back in, before slinging it over his shoulders and returning to Phantom, who was stirring slightly, but still very out of it. "Don't worry man," Dash said, pushing aside all of his fanboy urges since his hero's life could be, quite literally, in his hands. The town's hero. The world's hero.

But no pressure or anything.

Dash winced as he took in the sight of Phantom—he looked like he was dying, despite the fact that he's already a ghost. Pools of red-flecked, bright green ectoplasm were forming around him, and the ghost was shaking terribly. Letting out a determined breath, Dash bent down, putting one arm under Phantom's legs, the other just under his shoulders. "Sorry about this," he muttered, lifting Phantom from the ground with ease.

That woke him up for sure. He cried out in pain at the movement, his entire body shuddering and icy with…bloodloss? Ectoplasm loss? Whatever it was. Dash was kind of surprised at how _solid_ he was, despite how little he seemed to weigh, which was totally disproportionate to his size. Dash could feel the icy liquid-goop seeping from his wounds soak through his clothes, and he turned towards his car, thankful that they were already in the parking lot and that he lived just down the street from the theater.

He wasn't sure what to do with Phantom, but if he knew one thing for sure, he was not about to let his hero die in the parking lot of a movie theater. No way. So he slid Phantom into the backseat of his car, apologizing for the movement while the ghost kid cried out in pain. Thank God his parents were gone for the weekend. This would be hard to explain.


	4. Chapter 4

Danny opened his eyes and saw…nothing. For a minute he blinked, feeling the drowsiness in his head wear off, in favor of what he could only describe as excruciating pain. He was in the backseat of a car, laying on his side. At least whoever had put him in there had the sense to realize his back was basically in ribbons of semi-coagulated ectoplasm. It was hard to maintain his shape—yet still, the first thought that flashed in his mind as his vision started to blur was: _Intangibility, dumbass._

His vision swam in darkness, but he realized by then it wasn't because he was blind, but because he had hit his head so hard on impact. He looked to the driver's seat, not daring trying to move on his own—he must have at least ten broken bones. Sure, they'd mend themselves up and superglue themselves back together in a day or two, be totally healed in a week tops, but that didn't help the icy pain he felt now.

He blinked in surprise at who he saw driving. He was expecting Tuck or Sam, and for a moment, panic flared in him as he realized who it was. Dash Baxter, of all people.

Of course, there always was a little irony in how Dash idolized Danny Phantom, while he beat the crap out of Danny Fenton whatever chance he got.

The panic died down, some, when Danny caught sight of his own, snow white hair out of the corner of his eye. Of course, it was currently soaked with his own ectoplasm, but still. He didn't always have control over what form he was in while he was unconscious, but it didn't seem he had changed, which meant his secret was still safe.

His breathing was rough, fragmented, as his whole body shuddered violently. "Where—w-where are y-you…" he got out, not at all surprised at how weak it came out. He tried again, despite the way his throat protested. "Where are you taking me?"

Dash's gaze found his own in the mirror, as if he was surprised that Danny was conscious enough to talk. "My house," he said simply, and then noticing Danny's wince and responding whimper of pain at the motion, he continued. "Don't worry—my parents are gone all weekend, and I'm an only child, so I don't have any siblings, or anything. No one will know you're even there."

That made something settle in Danny's churning, nauseous, unstable stomach. He nodded momentarily, before hissing out a breath in pain. Note to self: nodding is _bad_. Don't do it. Idiot. The motion itself sent Danny's head swirling, as the pain throbbed obnoxiously somewhere behind his eyes. He allowed himself to close his eyes against the pain, and he didn't even realize he'd started to drift off again until there were big hands and a bigger frame bending over him, lifting him. This time, it didn't hurt as much, which was either really good or really bad. Judging by the small pool of ectoplasm he'd left on Dash's backseat, he guessed really bad. He was going numb.

"Man, you're _freezing._ Are you supposed to be this cold?" Dash asked him, shivering a little as he carried Danny into the house.

Danny snorted weakly, even though there wasn't anything very funny about this situation. "Ghost," he mumbled, as his only reply, eyes drifting shut again.

"Right," Dash grunted, and then Danny was laying down on some hard surface, curled up on his side so that the gashes in his back were facing Dash. "Oh, god—what did that ghost do to you?" he heard Dash breathe.

Shuddering, his entire body shaking, Danny cracked his eyes open. "Back—backpack."

Dash frowned. "What?"

Danny nodded towards the backpack still thrown over Dash's shoulders, again immediately regretting the motion. "Backpack. There's a f-first aid kit. Can you…?"

A beat later, "Oh, oh yeah. Hold on." He vaguely was aware of Dash rummaging through his bag, having to fight off the drowsiness that was dimming his vision. His eyelids were heavy. "Why does Fenton even have this?" Dash muttered, and Danny was fairly sure he found the larger than usual, fairly extensive first aid kit. "Okay," he said louder, his tone slightly panicked. "Now what?"

Danny's ragged breathing gave way to shallow breaths. "Get th-the needle…and lighter. String."

Though he wasn't facing Dash, he could basically sense his eyes widening. "You—you're going to stitch yourself up?" he asked, somehow alarmed and in awe at the same time.

Danny exhaled sharply. "No—can't reach. You are."

The silence behind him was deafening. Danny had to turn, slightly, to see what was happening, despite the way the motion pulled painfully at his back. He bit down on his lip to keep from crying out.

Dash had frozen in place, blinking with wide eyes at the half-ghost. Then, he started shaking his head. "I don't think—man, I don't know if I can do that," he admitted, and his voice was shaky.

Feeling more lightheaded than ever, Danny wondered how much ectoplasm he'd actually lost. "'m gonna die," he said weakly, but his voice brimmed with honesty as they both realized how true that statement was.

Dash looked nervous, which was… a new look on him. Danny had never really seen him wear anything but a neanderthalic rage, anger, an air of superiority and prestige. Now, though? He looked downright tentative. "But you're—you're already a ghost. You can't die again, can you?"

It was a last ditch effort, grasping at straws. Danny could visibly see him swallow, the needle and string shaking in his hand. " _Please_ , Dash."

And then Dash went into action, looking away from Danny and threading the needle before flicking the flame of the lighter on. He ran the steel needle through the flame, holding it there until the tip of the needle turned red-hot. "Okay," he exhaled. "Let's do it."

Danny braced himself for the sting of the needle, a feeling he's unfortunately gotten very used to, lately. It was as if the older he got, the less his enemies restrained themselves in their fights. They got better—of course, so had Danny. A hell of a lot better.

Apparently not good enough, though, if the way his back was in near literal shreds was any indication.

He couldn't feel the needle, though, and a moment later, he heard Dash mutter "What?" in confusion. "I don't—it's not working. The needle and thread aren't holding it."

Danny grunted. "Can't—can't heal like this."

Something clenched in Danny's stomach that had nothing to do with the pain he felt. He wouldn't be able to heal, wouldn't even be able to be stitched up, while he was in ghost form. He wasn't solid enough for the string to hold his skin together. He knew that, of course, from past experience, he just…there was no way he could keep his secret and survive. If he wanted to live, he had to be stitched up—if he wanted to be stitched up, he'd have to be human. Which meant…

"I'm gonna show you something," Danny exhaled shakily, his voice wavering. "But you have to—have to p-promise you won't tell. You c-c-can't tell."

For a moment, Dash was silent, and Danny had to open his eyes again to gauge his reaction. Having slight double vision, the Dashes blinked at him , their eyes wide. Then, slowly, they nodded. "Yeah—yeah. Of course."

"Y-you have to—to promise. You can't tell."

Danny let his eyes close again, while Dash swallowed audibly, rubbing his ectoplasm-covered hands on his jeans. "I—I promise."

"E-ectoplasm's thicker th'n blood," he croaked, barely audible. "You gotta—y'gotta go fast, 'kay? When I—when I do it. Or else'll bleed out." The addition of a pulse, Danny knew, would make him bleed out all the faster – put that together with blood thinner than ectoplasm, and he'd be dead in minutes is Dash didn't hurry.

Dash blinked, confusion clouding his eyes. "Wha—what?"

Danny cringed, curling into himself more. "Promise?"

Dash winced, looking more lost than ever, but after a moment got out, "Yeah—yeah. I promise."

Nodding despite the way it made his head scream, Danny pulled on the coldness in his core and triggered the familiar twin, silver rings.


	5. Chapter 5

Dash blinked down at the man lying on his table, unsure of what to make out of what just happened. Because first, there was a dying ghost, bleeding out ectoplasm and quivering. Then there were these odd looking rings encircling him, and as they ran up and down his body, there was this flash of light, kind of like the flash from the theater, earlier that night. And then, where Danny Phantom once laid now gave way to Danny Fenton, tattered and broken and torn.

Dash's head spun. What was happening, here?

"Fenton? How'd you—Phantom…" he trailed off as he realized that the red shirt Fenton wore was ripped to shreds, his raw, bleeding back exposed as dark red blood started to mix with the pool of ectoplasm Phantom had left. He had the same injuries as Phantom. But…how… "You're—you're him? He's you?" Dash asked, then, unsure of what else to say.

Fenton, still quivering on the table, looked at him with pleading, ice blue eyes. "You promised," he reminded the jock, his voice weak.

So this was the secret. Fenton and Phantom…they were the same person. They were the _same_? Did that mean…wait. Was Fenton dead? Dash eyed him wearily, realizing just how much blood he was losing. Far too much for a dead person—although, he'd _definitely_ be dead if Dash didn't do something to help him.

"I don't get this, Fenton," Dash sighed, closing his eyes. "What's going on?"

"Uh—d-do you think…stitch n-now, questions later?" With his eyes closed, Dash heard Fenton's voice, loud and clear…but it was the same voice he'd been talking to since he got in the car with the broken ghost kid. Phantom's voice was a little hollower, a little tinny, almost – like an echo of Fenton's voice. It had the same timbre as every other ghosts' voice, but behind the words… "P-please," Fenton stammered weakly, and Dash exhaled at the blatant similarities in their voices. He couldn't believe he didn't put it together sooner.

 _Dear God. Danny Fenton was Danny Phantom._

He opened his eyes, then, to return the pained, pleading, icy blue gaze of the guy he considered to be his hero for the last four years. Man, now he really did feel bad about wailing on him so much—but it was more than simply feeling _bad._ It was the kind of guilt that made him want to shrivel up into a little ball and hide in a corner for the rest of his life.

Swallowing in determination, Dash nodded, and Fenton's—no, _Danny's_ —eyes fluttered closed. He pushed everything out of his mind, even what he was doing, because the thought of sticking a needle through someone's skin and pulling it taught with another piece of skin was something he wasn't sure he could stomach.

He did it methodically, without thinking. If anyone at school ever found out, he'd be a dead man, but…Dash always was decent at sewing. His mom taught him when he was little, helped him make pillows and potholders when he felt like being a little creative. That's all this was. Sewing two pieces of cloth together. He tried not to focus on the way his fingers were becoming sticky with blood and ectoplasm, the way the body under his hands tightened with every stitch, the small gasps and shudders coming from the man.

Dash wasn't sure how long he took in stitching him up, but he wanted to do it right, so he took as much time as he dared without letting him bleed out. By the time he was done, Fenton had passed out from the pain, or maybe from the bloodloss, but his chest was still rising and falling, albeit shallowly, but Dash took it as a good sign. He looked at his stitching job—it was atrocious, honestly. It was ragged and uneven, but Dash had basically just sewn his entire back back together, and for that, he felt a small sense of accomplishment.

After reassembling Fenton's back, which had been shredded into ribbons of skin, he started to clean up a bit, not allowing himself time to think about what the hell was actually going on. Stitched up, Fenton was barely bleeding anymore, but the shirt he wore and the table he laid on was soaked in it. Carefully, trying not to jostle the sleeping man, he peeled the tattered shirt off of Fenton, using it to sop up some of the green-and-red mixture on the table. Man, it was like some kind of twisted Christmas movie. Dark red and neon green, swirling together in a concoction of festive horror.

By the time Fenton had begun to stir, Dash had finished cleaning, pulled one of his own shirts over Fenton's head after bandaging his back, and had moved him onto the couch so that he'd be more comfortable. He had taken a seat on the armchair across from him, watching him, the rise and fall of his chest, the fluttering of his eyelids. He slept like any other person would.

But he wasn't any other person. He was a ghost. How was he a ghost?

When Danny shifted slightly, cracking his eyes open and blinking them blearily, Dash had shot up out of the chair, his nerves getting to him. What was he supposed to say to him, to this kid who he's beaten up nearly every day for the past four years, this kid whose saved his butt time and time again—this kid who saved the entire _world_? How did he go about that? "Oh, hey—thanks for risking your life to save us all the time. Sorry I made your life even more of a hell than you were already in." Yeah—not likely.

He was still contemplating, lost in his own head, when Fenton began to sit up, groaning as he used his arms to try and push himself upright. Seeing him struggle, Dash bent down to help him, putting a hand gently but firmly under one of his arms, again surprised by how solid he was—how real. "Hey—you might want to take it easy," he advised, his voice shaking only slightly. "You, uh. You fell kind of hard."

For a moment, Fenton just sort of blinked at him, staring at nothing as his mind seemed to catch up with the events of the last few hours. Then he winced, stiffly moving an arm to press his hand against the small of his back, groaning a little as he shifted to reach higher, get a better feel of the extent of his injuries, instead meeting only the cloth of Dash's shirt and the bandages. Dropping his arms with a pained exhale, he lifted his gaze to Dash's, his icy blue eyes confused. "You helped me?" he asked, then, and his voice was low, cracking through the words.

Dash tried not to let himself feel hurt by the suspicion in the kid's voice. He had no reason to believe Dash had that kind of good in him, really. He cleared his throat, dropping his gaze just a fraction. "Er—yeah. I mean, you were bleeding everywhere. So I…" He shrugged awkwardly, not finishing.

Fenton let out a long breath then. "Thanks."

Dash nodded. "Don't mention it."

Fenton shifted, then, swinging his legs off of the couch but remaining seated, grimacing at the movement. "No," he said as he moved, and peered up at Dash curiously. "I mean it, though. Thank you. I would've died if you hadn't helped me."

Everything was starting to make sense, now. Why Fenton always disappeared whenever a ghost showed up—why he and Phantom never seemed to be in the same room together. Why he always showed up to school looking like he'd fallen down sixteen flights of stairs or something. Still, logistically, it didn't make sense to him—how could he be a ghost? Dash dropped his gaze to his fingers, and since he's never quite been one for subtlety, found himself asking straight out, "But aren't you already dead? How could you die _again_?" Then he winced, realizing how that could come across as sort of insensitive in a way. "I mean, you're a _ghost_ , a-and—"

"Half-ghost," Fenton interrupted, and when Dash lifted his gaze to him again, Fenton was rubbing his hands together, frowning. Then he noticed the dried, cracked skin that covered them, stretching across his knuckles and calloused fingers. It looked like they were covered in blisters, in sores—burns, almost. Red and inflamed and raw. "Hey—where'd my backpack end up?"

Blinking in surprise at the change in subject, Dash retrieved the backpack from the corner and placed it on the couch next to Fenton. He didn't understand. "Half ghost?" he asked, dumbfounded.

Wincing as he turned, exhaling in pain, Fenton searched the front pocket of his backpack for a moment before producing a small tube of what looked like neon green hand lotion. He squeezed a significant amount into the palm of his hand before nodding, and working it into his angry, raw skin. "It's a long story."

Dash watched in fascination, the lotion coating his hands in bright green—the same green as Danny Phantom's ecto-blasts, he realized. But as Fenton worked it into his skin, the cracks seemed to vanish, the dry, ashy skin clear. By the time it was completely worked in, his hands were still calloused, but healed. Dash sank back down into the armchair, still watching Fenton—no, _Danny_ —in shock. "What—what was that?"

Fenton glanced at him, brows drawing together. "Hm?" Dash had no words, simply nodding towards his hands. Following his gaze, Fenton nodded. "Right. Uh—the constant plasma rays over the last few years have kinda messed up my hands," he admitted, wiggling his roughened fingers a little. "Apparently human skin wasn't designed to withstand near-constant ecto-energy exposure – go figure, right?" He snorted. "My parents made this ecto-lotion to help fix them. It doesn't last long, but it helps with the pain."

Huh. So Fenturd's parents knew. Dash wasn't really sure what to think about that piece of information. They were ghost-hunters, after all…weren't they? Then again, he supposed it would have been hard as hell for Fenton to hide what he was doing for this long. Although, he's managed to hide from the rest of the world, so who knows. "Ecto-lotion?"

Danny snorted, then, but a newly healed hand flew to his forehead, as if the action had brought up a migraine. "Yeah. Dad's still trying to come up with a better name, though—says it doesn't do the Fenton family justice."

Again, though, Dash never was one for subtlety, and asks, then, "So your parents know? That you're…" he trailed off, though, not being able to say the words again. This was all too weird. This was wimpy Danny Fenton, the dweeby little nerd he's beaten up since junior high. There's no way that he's—

"Half ghost?" he suggested.

"Danny Phantom," Dash corrected, and he couldn't help his eyes widening even just at the name. "I mean—what the hell, Fenton?"

For a split second, he regretted the anger-laced words. Because now he knew that Fenton could probably take him down with his eyes closed and one hand tied behind his back. He never had, obviously, he'd never even tried to defend himself against Dash. That made him angrier—how Fenton had let him humiliate himself like that. Who did he think he was?

Well, Danny Phantom, apparently.

Fenton sighed, nodding. "Yeah, my parents know."

"And they're—they're okay, with it."

Danny's eyebrows shot up at that, something odd in his eyes. "I mean, _okay_ might be a little strong, but they've stopped hunting me and threatening to rip me apart molecule by molecule and dissect me, which is cool."

Dash's stomach twisted even more. "Your own parents hunted you."

Fenton's gaze hardened a little at that, and despite how it made him wince, shook his head once very adamantly. "They didn't know. It's not their fault I lied to them for so long." There was a defensive tone in his voice.

Dash swallowed, trying to pat down the anger flaring in his gut. "And they're – they're the only ones that know?"

Now that his parent's weren't being attacked, Fenton's gaze relaxed, the stony outlook fading. "Nah. So do Jazz, Tuck, and Sam—and now you, I guess." Then, a look of resignation passed across his features and his shoulders tightened, his gaze growing weary. "You're not—you're not going to tell anyone, right?" he asked, and Dash kind of hated the way his voice grew nervous but hard at the same time, both a question and a warning.

Swallowing the lump in his throat, Dash shook his head. "No. I promised."

The tension left Fenton's shoulders, and he nodded. "I appreciate it."

"Besides – who would believe me anyways, right?"

Danny cracked a smile. "Also true."

Dash nodded too, now, despite the way he felt blinded by confusion. How does something like this even happen? How could this little dweeb be half ghost? Does that mean he's half dead? Dash's stomach churned with the realization. He swallowed, his eyebrows drawing together. "Am I—am I gonna get an explanation here, Fenton?" he asked. "Because I'm not gonna lie, I don't understand…any of this."

"Shocker," Danny muttered, almost as if on instinct. Dash's chest tightened in his shame, and Danny winced apologetically. "Sorry," he amended, shaking his head. "Habit."

Swallowing, Dash looked down to his fingers, frowning. "I-it's okay," he said, and shook his head despite the way it felt like Fenton had just poured salt in his wounded ego. "I deserve it. I just…" Then he trailed off, shaking his head again, before looking up. "I don't get it. Why would you let me treat you like that for all this time? I mean, hell, Fenton, you let me pummel you to a pulp every other day at school, and then you just, what? Save our collective butts at night?" He raised his gaze back to watch Danny, in utter disbelief. "Why would you do that?"

Danny shrugged, then winced with a hiss of pain—the motion must've pulled at his back. "I dunno—because it's the right thing to do?" he offered, as if it were the obvious answer. He snorted. "Because I have a hero complex and can't seem to keep my big nose out of trouble?"

Dash scrubbed at his face with his hands. Around midterms or finals, his friends and classmates would always complain about their brains hurting, but Dash never really felt anything like that. Now? Now he did. He shook his head. "I—I beat you up, Fenton," he got out after a stretch of silence. "A lot. I beat you up a lot. And then, what—you spend your free time getting beat up by ghosts too?"

Again, Danny snorted. "I don't have free time, Dash," he laughed, but there was something in his eyes like disappointment, fatigue even. Like that was a battle he'd given up on long ago. "Even so, ghosts don't particularly care about fitting nicely into my schedule. Why do you think I have such shitty attendance at school? I don't think I've made it a full day all year. Or last year, for that matter. But… yeah, that's the idea."

Dash knew Fenton's attendance was crap—but where this fact used to give him a smug kind of satisfaction, another thing to harp on him for, it now made something tighten in his chest. He had always figured Fenton was lazy and skipping, or just didn't care enough to show up. He had found satisfaction in picking on this kid for so long… "But you never fought back," Dash argued, because that didn't make sense to him, it wasn't clicking in his head that there was a bigger moral to what Danny was saying. "All this time, after all these years, you never fought back."

Despite the pain he must be in, Danny arched an eyebrow at Dash, amused. "Dash, it wouldn't really be fair if I had," he pointed out, and Dash couldn't help but notice the slight undertones of satisfaction in the man's voice—like finally getting the chance to admit to being able to kick Dash's butt was a childhood dream come true. "But don't worry—all that pent up aggression went to a worthy cause. Mainly helping kick ghost butt. They deserve it more than you anyways." Then the satisfaction faded, and he became more earnest. "Besides—then I'd be no better than the revenge-seeking nitwits that haunt this city on a daily basis. It wouldn't be right." He paused, and the amusement returned to his eyes, and he rolled them. "Yeah, the whole "with great power comes great responsibility" thing. Go ahead, call me a wimp, whatever."

The words made Dash frown, and before he realized what he was saying, a vehement "I don't think you're a wimp," escaped his mouth. Danny lifted his eyes in disbelief, but Dash knew he couldn't get out of this one. He shrugged, a little sheepishly. "I dunno—when I think of Danny Phantom, I don't think wimp. I think hero."

Suddenly, it was as if Danny's gaze grew ten times stronger, intrigued by Dash's words, and Dash didn't want to look away. "Maybe," Danny qualified, an odd look in his blue eyes. "But what about when you think of Danny Fenton?"

They stayed like that for a moment, gazes locked. Finally, Dash broke it off. With his elbows resting on his knees, Dash dropped his head into his hands, closing his eyes as he thought. They really did look similar, he had to admit, mentally kicking himself for not seeing it sooner. Hell, even the names! Danny Fenton, Danny Phantom. It was right in front of him this whole time. He sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose before looking up again. "How the hell did all of this happen?" he asked wearily, and while some part of his brain was still fanboying out because here he was, sitting in his living room with Danny fucking Phantom, the ghost kid that managed to save the world and Dash's rear end a number of times, another part of him, the more dominant part, simply felt ashamed for not noticing it, for treating Fenton the way that he had. How dare he.

Danny sighed, then, and he shifted on the couch a little to reach for the glass of water on the side table. When he winced from the movement, freezing stiffly in his spot while he let out a hiss of pain through his nose, Dash stood and brought the glass to Danny. He took the it gratefully, sinking back into the couch cushions, gulping down the entire glass. Satisfied, he let out a small sigh. "Well, I guess that depends," he said finally, and met Dash's gaze again, eyebrows raised. "How much time do you have?"


	6. Chapter 6

"You…you were _electrocuted_ to death? By one of your parents' inventions?"

"Well— _half_ death, technically? But…" A nod.

He couldn't quite tell what was going on behind Dash's stormy, unusually dark blue eyes. He wasn't sure he wanted to know—what if Dash changed his mind, decided that he was too much of a freak, that he was some kind of… abomination? What if he _told_ people? Not for nothing, but Dash Baxter was never a person he'd grown to associate with the concept of _trust_. Yet here he is, spilling out the story of his life and afterlife and whatever you call this half-dead thing he's got going on, completely honest and unguarded.

But Dash simply let out a sigh, blinking his wide eyes. "And you—you woke up and you were…a ghost."

Another nod. "Pretty much."

"Trippy."

Danny snorted a little bit. "Tell me about it."

Dash did that thing he does when he thinks, one eye narrowing just a little bit, his head tilting just a little bit to the left. A part of Danny was worried he'd hurt himself, thinking so hard. His face still hadn't lost the flush on his cheeks, the pink dusting crawling up his neck. "So all of those times that ghosts came, and you ran and hid… it was actually just you leaving to go… fight them."

Danny smiled a little. "I figure, running away seemed like a good cover. No one's gonna expect the kid who runs and hides at the smallest mention of a ghost to be the one fighting them."

"Or to be one," Dash added, but his voice was low as he took it all in. "Or a half-ghost, at least…" he trailed off, shaking his head. "How—how does that even work? How can you be _half_ ghost?"

Danny pulled a face, something resembling a grimace. "Honestly? We don't really know," he admitted. "When the portal electrocuted me, it was trying to access the Ghost Zone, so it was mostly ghost energy going through it. It infused itself into my genetic code, or something?" Danny shook his head, the science behind his genetic makeup something he'd given up on trying to understand. Leave that to his parents and sister – ghost fighting, he could handle. Unknown species diagnostic testing? Not so much. He waved his hand dismissively. "Messed up my DNA. My mom knows more about the science behind it – but even she doesn't know everything. There are a ton of blanks that we can't fill in. It would be different if there were other halfas, but… there aren't. None that can help, anyways. So we just kinda roll with it."

Dash frowned, getting lost somewhere. "What do you mean?"

Danny shrugged, then, not really knowing how to explain it. "Long story," he settled on, and looked at his calloused hands for a moment. He held one out for Dash to watch, before in the palm of his hand, small wisps of ice blue light appeared. Dash made a small noise, and the wisps of blue began curling around each other in was looked like a miniature hurricane. A small, gentle flash of blue light later, a palm-sized ice crystal snowflake hovered a few centimeters above Danny's hand.

"When I'm human, I'm still too… ghostly," Danny continued, sending the snowflake into the air, where it floated lightly around Dash's head. His eyes were wide as his whole head turned to follow its path. "My body runs too cold, my heartbeat's irregular, and my blood and physical chemistry is contaminated with ectoplasm. But in ghost form, I'm too human. I have bones and muscles, to some extent, I still need food and water, I need to rest, to sleep – even if I don't get to a lot." Still, Dash only blinked, eyes locked on the snowflake, which slowed to a stop in the space between the two men. "Basically, we know next to nothing about it."

Dash, eyes still wide as they watched the snowflake, reached out a hand to touch it. He hesitated, casting an unsure glance at Danny. Danny offered him a small nod, answering the silent question, and Dash's gaze returned to the snowflake, reaching out again to cup the crystal in his hand gently. He pulled it towards him, but when Danny allowed it to settle in Dash's palm, his fingers tensed, spreading open wide as if he was afraid to touch it.

Danny chuckled a little bit, which earned him a patented Dash Baxter glare similar to the ones he'd receive in the hallways of Casper High whenever he crossed the jock's path. Ah, the good old days. "It's not going to melt," he assured Dash, nodding to the ice crystal. "No matter how long you hold it or how warm your hands are, it's not going to melt."

The glare faded from Dash's expression, confusion left in his eyes. "But, it's—" he broke off, looking down at the snowflake in his hand. "It's _ice,_ Fenton. What do you mean it isn't going to melt?"

"It's _ghost_ ice, Baxter," Danny reminded him. "It won't melt unless I want it to. Or I die. I think. I'd rather not find out – I mean, been there, done that, right?" His weak laugh trailed off when Dash didn't join in. Instead of laughing at the joke, the jock paled at least three shades. "Hey, it was—I'm kidding, Dash. It was a joke. Trying to lighten the mood, and all. I'm not dead." He frowned. "Not entirely, at least."

Dash dropped his gaze back to the snowflake in his hand, his fingers tightening around it, as if testing to see if it actually would melt. Danny wished he could see what Dash was thinking, what was going on in that giant head of his. After a moment of watching the crystal, Dash shifted his grip on it, instead holding it by one of the sides between his thumb and pointer finger. He held it up to the light, changing the angle of it to see the different ways the light catches the immaculate crystal. "You…" he began saying, not lifting his gaze from the snowflake. "You can do… even when you're not a—when you're... Fenton?"

Sighing, Danny nodded. That crystal of ice sure was entertaining Dash—maybe they're right about distracting pretty people with shiny things. He waved his hand vaguely, and in the air above them, four more small hurricanes of light blue appeared and spun, merging to create four more crystals, each its own unique snowflake. They began to float around the room, and when Dash dropped the one in his hands from shock, it joined the other four as they floated gently above their heads. "All of my powers work in either form," Danny affirmed, though he was pretty sure Dash had stopped paying attention to him, completely entranced by the ice crystals. "But it takes more out of me when I'm human. I'm stronger in ghost form."

Dash nodded, as if the phrase "ghost form" was as common in his everyday life as "football". His eyes stayed locked on the floating ice for another moment, before tearing his gaze away to regard Danny wearily. "And it's something you can just—you can just do whenever you want to. Turn... into a ghost."

Danny raised his eyebrows, nodding. "I can't really control what form I'm in when I'm unconscious or hurt, but other than that? Pretty much."

Dash let out a breath. "Cool."

They fell into a comfortable silence, then, Dash still in awe of the crystals floating around his living room, Danny filled with relief that Dash said "cool" instead of "weird" or "freaky." Danny wasn't sure what he would've done if he had. It was hard enough to maintain his wimpy kid façade as it was, let alone having Dash Baxter, of all people, trying to out him as some cross-species genetic freak.

Then again, some experience in alternate timelines and futures have shown Danny that Dash basically admired Danny Phantom too much to not be supportive. With the whole Freakshow incident, when his cover was blown, Dash, Paulina, Starr and the rest of the A-listers were the first people to actively go out of their way to help him hide from the GIW. In his Nocturn-induced-dream, Dash was downright friendly towards him.

Caught up momentarily in his relief, Danny hadn't noticed Dash returning his attention to him until he heard him speak. "Can you… can you show me?"

Danny hesitated, blinking at the former bully. It was weird to see Dash be so… _genuine_. Not a mask of superiority on his face, no arrogance in his eyes, no aggressive tension in his shoulders. Just curiosity and weariness, as if he was walking on eggshells.

Not saying a word, but eyebrows drawing together slightly, Danny pulled on the tickle of cold deep in his chest, allowing it to spread and consume every inch of his being, and familiar twin silver rings appeared around his torso where he sat.

He immediately regretted it. As soon as he began to change, icy pain flared in the muscles in his back. He could _feel_ them knitting themselves back together, tendons rippling and knotting around bones, muscles squirming under his mangled skin. The change was threatening to undo all of it, all the healing that was so loosely frayed as it was. He flinched, the rings barely making it to his shoulders and knees before he pulled them together again, stopping the change forcefully with a hiss of pain.

"Ah, ah—bad idea," he muttered, squeezing his eyes shut, swaying slightly. "I can—I can show you later. I need to heal more first." It took him a moment before he opened his eyes, and when he did, he noticed the snowflakes had melted, small wet stains on the rug beneath them. He winced. "Sorry. You might just need to take my word for it, for now."

But Dash seemed more concerned than anything, which was… odd. Danny had never seen this side of Dash before. It was almost as if he was _human._ "You okay?"

Danny's face was still pinched a little in pain, but he nodded nonetheless. "I'll be fine in like in like twenty minutes—half an hour, tops." Maybe it was an exaggeration, but hey, if it had the potential to offer up even an ounce of comfort, to either of them, it was worth a shot.

Still, that worried, dark look didn't leave Dash's eyes. He wasn't convinced. "What did—what did that ghost _do_ to you?"

Danny winced, shaking his head slightly, eyelids fluttering slightly in pain. "Beats me," he admitted, and allowed his eyes to close entirely for a moment. He took a breath, trying to steady the spinning feeling in his head. "I was—I was already pretty hurt, going into it," he continued, and opened his eyes again. "Had some nasty gashes on my back already from a run-in with Freakshow yesterday that hadn't entirely healed. Probably just reopened the wounds."

A flicker of recognition crossed Dash's features, and he worried his lower lip as he wracked his brain. "Freakshow? You mean—that creepy ringmaster from Circus Gothika?"

"The one and only."

Dash blinked. "I—I didn't even know he was a ghost. I just thought he needed more sun."

Despite the pain flaring through Danny's body, he let out a small laugh. "You're not wrong," he said. "But—no, he's not a ghost. He just wishes he was and uses other ghosts to try and compensate for the fact that he isn't." He couldn't help the bitterness that had seeped into his voice.

Now, Dash's eyebrows drew together, baffled. "Why? Who would actually _want_ to be a ghost?" Then, he cut Danny a sheepish glance, if a teenage boy his size could be called sheepish. "Uh—no offense."

Danny raised his eyebrows, but his voice was good-natured. "None taken," he said and shrugged. "But Freakshow's never cared. Has ghost henchmen that he uses to try and, I don't know—gain control. Power. One of them sort of—caught me off guard, yesterday. I hadn't healed fully yet, but went patrolling anyways. Didn't think anything of it; I just thought it was the Box Ghost coming back to give me a hard time. Hey," he said suddenly, and his eyes were more alert, "you didn't happen to see who attacked me, did you? I didn't get a chance to look, what with the whole… plummeting towards solid concrete, thing." He paused. "Not my proudest moment, either, by the way."

Dash frowned, gaze drifting to the backpack next to Fenton on the couch, where he'd stored the weird green thermos. "I recognized him, but I don't know his name. Blue guy, kinda vampire-y looking."

Danny's eyebrows shot up. "Plasmius? Aw, jeez. How did you get away from _him?"_

Dash blinked, returning his gaze to Fenton's, frowning slightly. "I—I didn't. I used that weird soup thermos thing I found in your bag." At Danny's slight arch of an eyebrow, he shrugged, almost sheepishly. "I've seen Phantom—uh, you… use it, before. In fights and stuff. To capture the other ghosts."

Danny let out a breath through his nose, nodding. "Right. So, uh—how long has he been in there?"

Dash glanced at the athletic watch that donned his wrist – gray numbers on an olive background indicated it'd been almost two hours, since the movie ended. He shifted. "An hour and a half, maybe? Why?"

Danny snorted, but a hand curled in front of him, pressing sturdily into his stomach as he did. "Just trying to figure out how far away I need to be before releasing him _._ If I had a list of Top 5 Places I Never Want to Go Again, I'm pretty sure the Fenton Thermos would be numbers three, four, _and_ five. He's gonna be pissed."

Something unpleasant coiled tightly in Dash's gut. "Did I… should I _not_ have captured him? I mean, it looked like he was about to waste you, and you—you were unconscious and bleeding everywhere, I didn't know what else _to_ do."

Danny shifted, fingers pressing harder in to his ribs as he did. "Nah, it's fine. Some time in the Fenton Thermos might be good for the crazy fruit loop anyways—teach him a lesson. Besides, sneaking up on me from behind? What kind of attack is that?" He shook his head. "I'd expect that of someone like Skulker, but Plasmius? He can do better than _that._ "

Dash, seeming completely overwhelmed, blinked at him steadily. "Holy shit. It's always been _you."_

Danny, confused at the sudden shift in conversation, frowned, blinking at Dash right back. "Uh—what? What do you mean?"

Dash shook his head a little, eyes wide. "It's always been _you._ You—you fought off all those ghosts, all these—these _monsters_ , it was really _you._ Pariah Dark and the Fright Knight a-and—that army of ghosts when that creepy warden ghost took over the city. When -when Phantom and I were shrunk down and trapped in Fentonworks... it was all _you._ Fenturd. _"_

His own eyes wide again, Danny continued to blink at the (former?) bully. "Uh—yeah, Dash. It was me. I thought we covered that already." He hesitated. "Are you okay?"

Dash dropped his gaze a little, and there was no trace of that familiar, smug arrogance in his face, in his eyes. He shook his head, and when he spoke, his voice was low. "It's not every day you find out you've been whaling on a hero for like three years."

Danny was surprised. He wasn't actually expecting Dash to say that. He shook his head, eyebrows drawing together. "Dash—"

"It's okay." Then Dash brought his gaze back up, meeting Danny's. "I _idolized_ Phantom, you know. Ever since that whole Pariah Dark thing. I even had a t-shirt made with his logo on the front – that was even before all the stores started carrying Phantom gear. Wore it under my jersey for every single football game since I got it, like a good luck charm or something. Kwan always teased me for it, but I didn't care – that guy was my hero."

Danny felt his gaze soften a little, something like guilt churning in his stomach simply for not ever telling the jock he knew exactly about his whole Phantom idolization. It was kind of like being in on a secret that he didn't have the rights to be a part of. "I know," he said honestly, and shrugged almost apologetically. "And I'm sorry your hero turned out to be a fraud."

Dash frowned at the words, his eyebrows drawing together but his eyes widening ever so slightly. "He's not, I mean – you… you're not a fraud. I just…" he trailed off, and shook his head. "Hearing you— _Fenton,_ talking about all these, these—ghosts, and these ghost attacks, it's really…" He trailed off again, and shook his head, letting his eyes close. It was as if he was trying to clear his head, and his fingers tightened into half-fists as his hands rested on his knees. "I think it all just sort of hit me. Again."

Danny let out a breath. He was all too familiar with that feeling, with the experience of everything just flowing back and smacking you in the face. It was like flying full speed into a brick wall—a sensation he's become well used to, by this point. He made a face of apology, and there was sympathy in his voice when he said quietly, "It's a lot to wrap your mind around."

Dash nodded in agreement, before scrubbing at his face. "So what—what now?" he asked tiredly, and returned his gaze to the halfa's. "I mean, what—what happens next?"

The question was nearly answered for him, when something buried deep in the backpack began to vibrate.

Danny's eyes widened a little, one hand flying quickly to his—now empty—ear. "Oh, _shit._ Tucker and Sam." Without even hesitating, he turned his arm intangible, reaching into his bag to retrieve the ringing cell phone, despite the way Dash's eyes threatened to bug out of his head at the display. Pulling it from the bag frantically, he nearly dropped it in his efforts to answer before it stopped ringing. "He—hello? Sam? Tuck?"

A pause. A shallow exhale, tinged with relief.

"Where the _hell_ have you been?"


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: Bit of a longer chapter, and I was going to split it up into a 2-part finale of sorts, but I think it works best as a singular, cohesive piece, so... enjoy! I present to you 5K+ words of nonsense acting as a partial resolution because I can't write concrete endings to save my life yay

* * *

"We've been trying to contact you for over an _hour._ "

Danny winced, glancing up at Dash as his fingers tightened around the phone in his hand. "I know, I know—I'm sorry."

From the other line, Sam's voice hesitated. "You weren't answering your Fenton Phones—Danny, are you okay?"

Wincing again, he rubbed at the back of his neck, sinking into the cushions a little. The pressure of it on his back stung, but made him feel _secure._ Like he wasn't about to rip his stitches open, wasn't about to tear his back apart again. "Yeah, Sam, I'm—I'm fine. My Fenton Phones must've gotten knocked out when I fell."

 _"_ _Fell?"_ Sam's voice repeated. "What do you mean, _when you fell?_ Danny, what happened?"

He opened his mouth for a second, closed it silently, then opened it again. "Ah—Vlad happened."

A beat of silence. "Are you okay?" she repeated, a little bit of the heat gone from her voice. Across from him, Dash watched with wide, confused eyes as he shifted on the chair uneasily.

Danny nodded, despite knowing she couldn't see him. "Yeah, yeah. I'm good."

"Thank God." Then, a pause. "Where are you?"

Danny's gaze found Dash's again—confused, panicked, only following half of the conversation. "I, uh—I got a little help." Again, Dash shifted nervously.

"Help from _who?_ Danny, _where are you_?"

Danny, gaze still locked with Dash's, wet his lips. "It's—it's kind of a long story, Sam, but I promise everything's okay—"

" _Danny."_

"I'm at Dash's house." The words came out in a rush. He swallowed, slowing his mind. "I'm, uh - I'm at Dash's house."

Sam, on the other line, fell silent. Danny felt his fingers tighten around the phone in his hand again, bracing himself preemptively. He could hear Tucker in the background, questioning what was going on, whether or not he was okay, what had happened.

When Sam spoke again, her voice was… calm. Almost too calm. There was an eerie amount of control in it when she asked, simply, "And you're sure you're okay?"

"Yeah," he responded quickly, eager to diffuse whatever bomb was about to go off. "Sam, I'm totally fine, I swear."

There was another moment of silence between the two, and Danny closed his eyes. He could only imagine what Sam's face looked like, forced calm, but violet fire flaring in her eyes. She'd always been protective, of him. Always hated the way Dash pushed him around. He wouldn't want to be on the wrong side of that fire if his half-life depended on it. Finally, Sam spoke again.

"How much does he know?"

Danny, eyes still closed, winced. "Uh—basically everything."

There was a sharp inhale from the other line, and Tucker, in the background, finally seemed to gather that it was probably best for him to _stop talking._

"We're on our way."

* * *

Dash was terrified.

Really, there was no other way to describe what he felt. His heart hammered obnoxiously loud in his ears, his breathing slow but shallow. His chest was tight from anxiety and he kept having to wipe his clammy palms on his jeans to keep them dry. He was speechless, sitting there on that chair as Manson, _of all the people in the world,_ paced in front of him, ticking items off on her fingers like reading from a checklist of rules and regulations and threats she needed him to get into his head _right then._ Lecturing him like some kind of prison warden. As if he was in the wrong, as if he had made some terrible mistake. As if he hadn't just saved someone's life.

It was just because she didn't trust him, he knew. And he didn't entirely blame her.

His gaze moved from the livid goth towards where Foley and Fenton sat on the couch behind her. Foley had his arms crossed, significantly more mild-tempered than his goth friend, but eyes calculating and expression guarded nonetheless as he watched Dash. Fenton, on the other hand, simply made a sort of helpless expression and shrugged apologetically. Like, _hey, what can ya do?_

"Are you even listening to me?"

Dash blinked, looking up at the young woman again. She'd stopped in her tracks, her arms crossed over her chest and violet eyes boring into his own, fierce, protective. He swallowed. "W-what?"

She clenched her teeth, her fingers curling a little tighter into her biceps. "I said, _are you listening?"_

Quickly, Dash nodded, trying to calm her. "Yes—yes, I'm listening," he assured her hastily.

Sam nodded, and she was short and willowy and _weak looking_ compared to the people he usually hung out with, but standing over him like that made him feel like an ant under a magnifying glass. "Good. Because I swear to God, if you do anything to _hurt Danny,_ I'm going to—"

"Sam!" Fenton cut her off, shifting forward on his seat a little, wincing as he did so, but not standing. "Sam, it's—it's okay. Don't terrify the guy."

Sam's attention turned on him, then, and secretly, Dash relished in the fact that the heat of her anger was being directed somewhere else, if only for a moment. He felt his shoulders relax, as Sam dropped her hands to her sides.

"Danny," she sighed, and her voice was significantly softer than it had been when she'd addressed him. Again, not something that wasn't expected. She shook her head, but again, there was less fire in it. "Look, I'm glad you're okay, and I'm glad he helped you, but I don't… I don't _trust_ him, okay? He's given us no reason to think he's on our side, and with what he knows, he could—he could— _you_ could end up…" She trailed off. Her jaw tightened again, and she turned back to Dash.

Once again, a fist of iron clenched in his gut, and he really thought it might just be easier if the chair he sat on swallowed him up whole. She shook her head again, and a bit of that hardness, that _edge_ had returned to her glare. "We're not going to let you hurt him," she told him, succinct. "I don't trust you. I see through the whole _nice guy_ thing you're pulling. You're a bully. You've made our lives miserable for _years._ Just because you did one nice thing one time doesn't mean everything is hunky dory now, alright? You get it?"

Swallowing hard, Dash couldn't hold her gaze. He nodded solemnly, slowly. He shouldn't have expected anything less. "Yeah. I get it."

"And if a word about this _ever_ leaves your lips, if you put his life in danger because you can't keep your big mouth shut—"

"Sam!" Again, Fenton cut her off, eyes wide.

Sam watched the jock for another moment, before her expression softened. Just a little, just enough to be noticeable—not nearly enough to be considered _soft_ by any stretch of the imagination, but not entirely icy anymore. She took a breath in through her nose and let it out slowly. She nodded again. "That being said," she continued, calmer, more in control, though it seemed to pain her to get the rest of the words out, "thank you. For helping him. You didn't have to do that, and he'd probably be dead if you hadn't, so—thanks."

Startled, Dash looked up again, meeting her gaze once more. It was honest. Reluctant, still irritated and still hard and still guarded, but… it was definitely honest. Dash nodded slightly. "Yeah," he replied, but his voice was unsteady. He cleared his throat. "Yeah, no problem."

"Look, man," Foley spoke up for the first time since the two of them had stormed into his house. Sam had hit the ground running with the lecturing, beginning even before they'd crossed over the threshold of his front door. Tucker let his arms drop, resting his elbows on his knees as he leaned forward. "We just—we can't risk this stuff getting out, you know? And you're not exactly number one on our People We Trust list, if you know what I mean. You've been… kinda terrible to us, dude. In case you missed that."

Dash nodded letting out a sigh. "Yeah. I get it," he repeated.

"So," Foley continued, and there was this _seriousness_ in his eyes that seemed so out of place that Dash's breath caught in his throat. "I'm gonna ask you straight—can we trust you with this?"

Dash felt his eyebrows draw together, and his gaze drifted to Fenton's on the couch next to him. The halfa's expression was guarded—but not necessarily hostile. Dash nodded. "I—yeah, of course. I already promised him I wouldn't tell."

When he looked back to Foley, there was a twitch at the corner of the techno-geek's mouth, and a little bit of the seriousness in his eyes had let up as he rolled them slightly. "Okay, sure—but Danny's _Danny_ , okay, you could tell him you'll never bully another soul and he'd believe you. He's stupidly optimistic about people like that. That's why _I'm_ asking you, now. I know we're not friends and I know you think we're lame and wimpy and a huge waste of space, but I need you to realize how dangerous it is for him if this gets out. And, not for nothing, but… if something happens to Danny this whole town's in trouble. So it's not just _his_ ass on the line—yours is, too. So do what you do best and think about yourself, okay, before you think about saying anything to anyone. Because if something happens to Danny, we're all ghost toast."

Fenton made a strangled kind of sound, then. " _Tuck…"_

Tucker continued though, despite Fenton's plea. "I'm serious. There's an entire government agency out there looking for any excuse to bring Phantom in—if this get out and gets to them, Danny'll be hauled off to some lab in the middle of nowhere to be experimented on, or… something worse. This stays between _us_. No Paulina, no Kwan, no Starr. No one. Just us."

"I can protect myself," Danny protested, then, and though the words didn't directly involve him, Dash could tell it was an attempt to take some of the heat off the quarterback. It made some of the tension in Dash's stomach uncoil because, well—at least there was _someone_ there that thought he was good for his word.

Sam raised her eyebrows at Fenton and nodded, before settling down to the couch on his other side to assess him for any injuries besides the one on his back. Her fingers danced over his arms, his chest, his sides expertly—nothing _intimate_ about it, instead quick and concise and professional in the way they worked. "But you won't," she countered, and there was a lot less heat in her voice and expression than there was, a hint of something lighter in its place. Satisfied he wasn't injured anywhere else, a hand settled on his knee more softly, more closely. "That's why we're here. You protect the world, we protect you. It's in the job description."

Tucker nodded, a smile flicking onto his face again as he returned his gaze to Dash's. He sighed. "Look, Dash—we're sorry for the third degree, and all, dude, it's just… this is important. We need to know what we're getting into."

Dash took in the scene in front of him for a beat. It was bizarre—this trio sitting here, in his living room, watching him with expectant and not-exactly-trusting eyes, but still eyes that had lost a significant amount of initial anger and suspicion. The Most Unlikely Trio to Ever Visit the Baxter House, and yet, here they were—sitting on his couch, Fenturd wearing one of his old Dumpty Humpty concert t-shirts, watching him squirm under their gazes like a suspect in an interrogation room. He swallowed, bringing his gaze to Foley's again and then to Sam's. He nodded. "Your secret's safe," he assured them, putting as much earnestness as he could into the words. "I swear."

Holding his gaze for a moment, Sam stayed silent. Then, as if by some miracle, something loosened in her shoulders and her expression softened, offering him a nod. Okay.

The gentleness, the _vulnerability_ of the moment didn't last long, however, because a split second later, her expression hardened once more. It was less _anger,_ though, and more annoyance than there was before; and without any sort of warning, her gaze moved back to Fenton's and she smacked him upside the head.

Dash's eyes blew wide, because sure, it was in friendly annoyance, but it was done so _casually_ that he couldn't believe it. She just… hit him. Like it was nothing. Like he wasn't this powerful, otherworldly force of nature. Like he was just plain, old, wimpy Fenton.

The half-ghost started, a hand flying to the back of his head where he'd been stricken. "Uh— _ow?"_

Sam crossed her arms, all disapproval now. "What were you _thinking,_ Danny?" she questioned, shaking her head at him. " _Oh, it's just the Box Ghost, get me some popcorn I'll be back in a jiffy—_ you idiot, you could've _died._ I told you Tuck and I should've come with you."

Fenton offered her a sheepish smile. "You're not _wrong,"_ he admitted, lowering his hand from his head, "but in my defense, I had no idea it was Plasmius. And if I wasn't already hurt, there's no way I'd have gone down after one hit. That's like—embarrassingly bad. That's like _freshman year_ bad. It was pitiful. I'm ashamed of myself."

Still, that sheepish smile donned his face and there was a spark of actual _humor_ in his eyes, like his near-death experience was nothing more than a trivial development. Across from the couch, Dash realized it probably _was._ He probably _could've died_ hundreds of times. He's probably had more near-death experiences than anyone.

His stomach twisted in sudden nausea as his train of thought crashed entirely. Near… re-death? Experiences? The portal accident. Was that a near-death experience? Every brush with death since then, were those just… _re-deaths?_ If he died as a human, would he come back as a ghost? If he died as a _ghost,_ would he… come back at all? Stay human? Would it count as _dying_ if he was already…?

He wasn't sure. Either way, he felt himself go pale. Man, he didn't understand _any_ of this.

Seemingly oblivious to his internal lightning storm inside his head, Sam pursed her lips for a moment, before shaking her own. "Just promise me you won't go out patrolling alone until you've healed up this time, yeah?" she said to Danny, and it was quiet and honest.

Again, Fenton's smile was sheepish, and the damn kid actually looked _chastised._ "Sorry for being an idiot," he apologized, amusement in his eyes still but sincerity in his voice. "I'd say it won't happen again, but that'd probably make me a liar."

Dash knew they were close—hell, they were nearly attached at the hip, those three. He just never understood it before. It made sense to him now, of course, why they were always so close, so secretive, so unwaveringly loyal to one another. Close enough that they feel no qualms about smacking this supernatural _hero_ upside the back of the head and chastising him for being an idiot. Close enough that he _listened_ to them. Close enough that they were so at ease with each other despite the ectoplasm staining his couch, despite the first aid supplies scattered across the kitchen table the room over, despite the outsider, this complete stranger to them now wedging his way into some secret group he was never invited to.

"Hey, at least you're admitting it," Foley was joking, and Dash blinked out of his reverie as the techno-geek's eyebrows drew together. He needed to focus. He needed to _be there._ He blinked again. "So, fill me in a little, here. If Plasmius shoots you out of the sky and you fall unconscious—something you could've _avoided,_ by the way, because, hello, ghost, intangibility, dumbass—then… what happens to Plasmius?"

Fenton's gaze flicked to Dash, who's eyes grew wide as a grin broadened on the halfa's face. "Dash found me," he told them, and raised his eyebrows at the jock. "Sucked old Cheesehead into the Thermos before he could do any more damage."

Nearly in sync, Foley and Manson's eyes shot to their hairlines. "So… you're saying Plasmius is in a Fenton Thermos right now," Foley clarified, and his gaze moved to Dash's. "And that _you_ put him there?"

Dash felt heat climb up his neck. "I mean—it's not like it was _hard,"_ he muttered, rubbing his palms on his jeans. Again, all the attention was on him, and it wasn't in the awestruck, _just scored the winning touchdown at the championship game_ kind of attention that he was used to. "Just uncap the thing and point."

The techno-geek rolled his eyes a little. "Well, yeah, sure—but _you_ put him there, right?"

Cautiously, Dash nodded. "Uh—yeah."

Now he grinned, and Dash simply got this _bad feeling_ in the pit of his stomach. " _Awesome_. So when we let him out and he tries to waste Danny for trapping him there, we get to point him your way. Excellent."

" _Tuck,"_ Fenton chided, but laughed anyways. He glanced at Dash. "He's kidding."

"Is he, though?" Foley questioned. "Is he really?"

" _Yes,_ he is," Fenton insisted, a smile still on his face as he returned his attention to Dash. "Don't worry about Plasmius. We'll keep him away from you."

Dash blinked, because there was such _certainty_ in Fenton's voice when he said that, as if he didn't have to think twice about it. He shook his head a little, eyebrows drawing together slightly over still-wide eyes. "But he…" he began, frowning deeper, "he tried to waste you. He could've. You could've died."

Still, Fenton only shrugged a little before wincing and shifting in his seat. "Kinda how this works, dude," he admitted. "Ghosts attack, we get beat up, someone nearly dies, puns are exchanged, we kick ghost butt. It's a pattern." When Dash didn't say anything, the amusement in Fenton's eyes flickered. "Dash, standard question, but… uh, are you okay, man? You're looking a little weird."

Dash didn't _understand_. He was trying, trying so hard, but… he couldn't make sense of it all, in his head. "You just…" he began, and his voice sounded shaky even to his own ears. "You keep doing this even though it could kill you." He shifted his gaze, from one friend to the other. "You… all do?"

"Nature of the game, dude," Foley replied, almost _offhandedly,_ as if it was nothing. "Gotta take a few risks for the greater good, and all that."

It confirmed everything he'd been thinking. A lead weight sat in his stomach, and he nodded, numbly. "Right. Yeah."

Still, Fenton watched him with curious, almost _concerned_ eyes.

A moment of silence settled around them, a weird, nearly palpable tension hanging in the air. Finally, after what felt like a painfully long time, Sam cleared her throat. "Well," she started lightly, easily, as if there'd been no cloud of nervousness clinging to them, "this has been _tons_ of fun, and all, but we really should be getting home, and _you—"_ she glanced to Danny, raising her eyebrows, "—should get some rest and heal." She rose from the couch, offering a hand to the wounded halfa. "Come on."

"So what?" Dash asked suddenly, and there was a sharpness to his voice that startled even himself. He looked back to Danny, who was still watching him with that careful, concerned look. "Am I just supposed to act like nothing's different? Like you aren't flying around every night saving people's lives and putting your own at risk?"

Though the question was directed to Danny, watching Dash carefully, Sam nodded. "That's exactly what you're supposed to do," she said evenly, her voice hard.

Dash grit his teeth, his confusion boiling almost seamlessly into an annoyed anger. He rose from his seat, hands curling into fists at his sides. This, he could work with. Anger, he knew what to do with. Confusion and _guilt_ and… worry? Those were more foreign. He shook his head. "You can't just _leave,_ expect me to pretend like none of this ever _happened._ "

Sam raised her eyebrows at him, and if Dash didn't know any better, _she actually sized him up_. "And what if we do? Just leave? What are you gonna do to us, huh?"

Dash's fists clenched tighter because, really—what would he do? The fight seemed to drain out of him as quickly as it had appeared, and he sank back down to the chair, elbows on his knees. He dropped his head into his hands and closed his eyes.

There was a beat of silence, before Foley's voice spoke. "Dash, it's—it's all gonna be okay, dude. Alright?" Then a pause, in which Dash looked up briefly to see Foley blink his wide, green eyes. "Wow, comforting _Dash Baxter._ Never saw that one coming."

Dropping his head again, Dash's eyes closed once more.

Someone sighed. "We really _should_ get him home, Dash," Sam's voice said, only it had lost a lot of the steel it had held. In fact, it almost sounded apologetic. "We can… talk about this some more later, okay? After school, or something."

Never lifting his head, Dash nodded slowly. Okay.

A moment of hesitation later, and he could hear them set into motion, without another word. Sneakers on the carpet, crossing over to the tile of the kitchen to retrieve the abandoned first aid supplies. A backpack being zipped up. A front door being unlocked. It was almost a relief, them leaving—maybe he could make some goddamn _sense_ out of everything, without them looking down his neck and offering up new tidbits of crazy every other second.

He heard the door swing open and a pained hiss of breath as one of the two presumably helped Fenton stand. He winced himself, remembering the botched stitching job he'd performed a ground shifting secret ago. All that blood he'd lost.

But before he heard the door close behind them, leaving him alone, Fenton's voice floated to him. A low whisper to his friends, a simple, "Hey—give me a sec, guys?" that made Dash lift his head again and look towards them.

Sam and Tucker both sent him cautious glances from across the room, but nodded to their friend nonetheless before stepping outside and closing the door behind them. Slowly, leaning slightly against the closed door—though not nearly as much as Dash had been expecting him to—Fenton turned back to him, shrugging a little sheepishly.

"Sorry," he exhaled, wincing a little as he shifted into a better position, and crinkled his nose a little. "They're a little, uh—overprotective. They mean well."

Dash snorted. He actually _snorted._ It was funny, especially since the only word he could form on his lips as a response was, "Yeah."

For a moment, they stayed in silence. Then Danny sighed. "Look. I know it's-it's a lot to get used to. Believe me, I do. But it isn't..." He trailed off, as if not knowing how to phrase what he wanted to say. "It isn't anything new. I've been doing this since freshman year-the only thing that's changed is that now you know it's me."

"Yeah, which freaks me out," Dash admitted, almost automatically, so openly honest that Danny winced a little and dropped his gaze. Of _course_ , the words he finally found, as honest and true as they were, came out wrong. Dash pulled a face. "No, Fentoad, I just mean—it freaks me out that you've been doing this for years, now, and protecting everyone and stuff, and you just… show up to school all beat up, and still no one cares enough to even try and put two and two together. Not that you're _him_ , or that you're a-" Dash broke off, swallowing hard.

"Ghost?" Danny offered, shaking his head a little. "It's not a bad word, dude." Danny paused, and after a moment, pressed forwards. "Look. You don't need to…treat me different, or anything, now that you know. While I admit it would been nice not getting thrown into lockers every time we pass each other in the hallway, you don't need to act like we're friends now, or anything. I'll still take the pummelings like a champ—I'll even throw in some public cowering, if you want. Special treat."

"I don't want," Dash said adamantly, so immediately and seriously that it couldn't be anything but the truth. The humor dropped from Danny's expression, cautious, unsure of where Dash was going. Again, the jock shook his head. "I don't—I don't want it to be like that, anymore. Obviously I don't want it to be like that." There was something happening in that blonde head, he was sure Danny could practically _see_ it. Wheels turning, storms brewing in those blue eyes. Quietly, he spoke again. " _I_ don't want to be like that."

Danny blinked. "Are you… being serious?"

"I mean… yeah," he sighed, and a flush crept its way up his neck. He scrubbed at his eyes. "You're—you're a _good dude,_ Fenton. You're like, a really good dude."

"Uh… thanks?"

"I've been pounding on a _good dude_ for four years," Dash continued, and shook his head again. He couldn't believe it. "That makes me a _bad dude."_

Danny shifted on his feet again. "I mean—on some level you had to have known that _bullying_ people isn't exactly a nice thing to do, Dash. I mean, even _you_ aren't that dense."

Dash closed his eyes. "I didn't realize I was a _bad dude,_ though, Fenton. I was never trying to seriously hurt anyone, I just—it was fun. Made my friends laugh, kept things interesting."

Danny hesitated. "Isn't much fun for the people on the other end of it, though. That I can promise you."

Eyes still closed, Dash dropped his head into his hands, elbows rested on his knees. "God, I'm—I'm just as bad as the ghosts are." His fingers tightened, mussing up his blonde hair. "I mean, what if I—what if there are more _good dudes_ out there whose lives I just… make miserable?"

Danny's expression turned apologetic. "Everyone has the potential to be a _good dude,_ Dash. Anyone you pick on could be one. And okay, maybe they're not… flying around, saving people from ghost attacks, necessarily, but there are other ways to be a hero. What I do doesn't make me any more of a good dude than anyone else you've picked on. I mean, Lester, Mikey—they're good dudes, too. They don't deserve to be beaten up any more than I do."

The lead weight in Dash's gut grew heavier. "God, I'm—I'm _worse_ than the ghosts," he corrected, again scrubbing his fingers through his hair, head still lowered.

"Hey," Danny tried to comfort, but it was _odd,_ because this man—he made this man's life absolute _hell_ at every possible opportunity. Why would he _comfort_ him? Stubborn hero complex, maybe? "There are ghosts out there that are downright evil. All things considered, you're not a _bad dude."_ He hooked a thumb over his shoulder, gesturing to where his friends were, undoubtedly, waiting on the stoop with his backpack. "Plasmius is a bad dude," he continued, and let his arm drop once more. "Pariah Dark is a _bad dude._ You?" He shrugged, bringing his gaze back to the jock's. "Minor nuisance. And, like I said," he continued, and something in his voice made Dash look up again. Danny shrugged a little. "Everyone has the potential to be a good dude. Even a high school bully."

Dash held his gaze for a second longer, before scrubbing at his face with his hands and letting out a long exhale. All weariness and exhaustion. "Well, if it's worth anything, Fenton, I'm—" he broke off, because it was so _inadequate_ he was almost embarrassed to say it. "I'm really sorry."

He looked almost surprised at the words, and really, Dash couldn't entirely blame him. A small smile flicked at the corner of his mouth, and he nodded a little. "I appreciate it, Dash. And—word of advice?" he offered, and gestured in the air a bit aimlessly. "Don't think about it too much. All this. It'll just confuse you more, and I don't mean that as an insult—we're rolling on year four and I still don't understand what the hell's going on half the time. I find it best to kinda just… roll with the punches." He paused. "Sometimes literally."

The corner of his mouth flickered, he could feel it. A small smile, grateful and tired and honest. "Yeah," he agreed, and nodded a little. "Yeah, alright."

Danny smiled too, a little, before nodding over his shoulder a little. "I should go." A pause. "Thank you, again. For... you know. Keeping it secret. And, er—saving my life. I appreciate it."

Dash nodded again, smile growing a touch. "Of course. Anytime."

The half-ghost grinned then, and it was amazing that those tired eyes could hold so much humor in them, eyes that sometimes appeared like eyes of a war veteran when the light hit them just right. "Well, I try not to make a habit of nearly dying, but, uh—I'll keep that in mind."

When he turned to go, though, Dash found himself rising from his seat again. "Fenton—uh, Danny?" he asked quickly, and the raven-haired teen turned back to him with surprise in his ice blue eyes, hand frozen halfway to the doorknob. Dash shrugged a little, the smile fading from amused to sincere as his eyebrows drew together a gently. "Thank you."

A moment passed where they just kind of stood there, and Danny sort of just _watched_ him. It felt like it lasted forever, but in a blink of an eye, that bizarre gentle moment was gone and Danny was grinning at him again, mischief creeping into his eyes in what Dash could _swear_ were sparks of green. "Don't thank me yet, dude," he warned, still grinning. "I still have to stop Tuck from siccing Plasmius on you."

Dash returned the halfa's grin with one of his own, and laughed a little. He had a feeling this was a start of a very interesting friendship.

* * *

There may or may not be an "Epilogue" chapter for this fic, I haven't decided yet. But, as of right now, that's quite literally all she wrote, folks. Thank you to everyone who read and responded, I can't believe some of the reviews I've gotten for this story, it means a lot to me knowing that something I wrote can bring joy into other people's lives lol. So... I'm thinking that's it. There might be another story in the works as a sort of spin-off of this one, less about the actual Phantom/Fenton revelation and more about adapting to this brand new world Dash was exposed to, sort of on the outskirts of the inner circle of Team Phantom. We'll see how it goes :)

Again, thank you so much for reading! Drop me a message or leave a review, I'd really love to hear from you!

And... on that poetic note, TTFN


	8. Epilogue

**A/N:** Ask and you shall receive. Also, no one can convince me Danny's not one to double-text. With everything going on in that kid's head, there's no way he gets all his thoughts out on the first try. Give me double-texting Danny. Give me triple-texting Danny. Fight me.

* * *

There was something _different_ in the air when Dash arrived at school on Monday.

Not a bad different, per say, but different nonetheless. And maybe it wasn't the school, at all. Maybe it was him. Maybe _he_ was different.

But he'd finally gotten his head on straight, which was what mattered the most, wasn't it? He'd finally made some sense out of everything that had happened. Not _entirely_ , no, but… enough. He made enough sense out of the ghosts, and the fights, and the injuries. He made enough sense out of it that his head didn't feel like it was going to implode on itself, anymore. He made enough sense out of it to feel pangs of guilt and actual worry when the Sunday night news reported a livestream broadcast of Danny Phantom getting his ghostly ass _handed_ to him in a fight against a dragon ghost ten times his size. He made enough sense out of it that his thumb only hovered over his phone screen for a moment the following morning before sending the simple text.

 _You good?_

A couple minutes had passed in radio silence, and Dash had tried to brush it off. He was busy. He was getting ready for school. He was eating breakfast. Walking to class. Flying to class?

Of course, that didn't stop him from nervously checking his phone every thirty seconds in search for a reply. It didn't stop his heart from beating slightly faster in his chest, didn't stop his palms from sweating, didn't stop his breathing from becoming shallow and quick. He was panicking, and he knew it, but he was _damned_ sure he would never admit to it.

So he sauntered into Casper High like any other day, on hyper-alert for his phone to vibrate in his pocket, fumbling with the lock on his locker and shoving his books inside messily. He wouldn't let the thoughts of _what if_ even cross his mind. What if he hadn't healed completely, and was out there hurt somewhere? What if he was _still_ out fighting that dragon? What if he _lost,_ what if he—

His phone vibrated, and Dash started, nearly dropping his bag to the floor. He pulled the phone from his pocket and fumbled to unlock it, finger sliding frantically across the bottom. It didn't catch, at first, and his efforts quickened, catching his breath until the phone finally unlocked.

The text was short, simple.

 _Totally. Why?_

Dash hesitated. Was it a brush off, or was he actually good? Was it just an indirect way to tell Dash to mind his business? Sure, he wouldn't entirely blame him if it _was,_ but… it didn't sit right with him. No, they didn't have to tell him everything that happened now. And honestly, he wasn't sure he wanted them to. But he couldn't just pretend like he didn't _know_ anything. He couldn't stay out of it _entirely._

His fingers hovered over the keyboard on his screen for a moment, before sending the reply.

 _News,_ he typed simply. _Dragon?_

Phone still in his hand, he eased his locker door shut and turned towards where his class was—only to run head on with a familiar, large frame.

"Whoa," Kwan laughed, putting a hand on Dash's shoulder to steady him as he stumbled back. "You okay, man?"

Dash blinked at his best friend, heart rate slowing slightly. It was just Kwan. He smiled a little, slipping his phone back in his pocket. "Yeah," he exhaled, and gave him a nod. "Yeah, all good. What's going on?"

Kwan gave him an odd look, turning towards the locker neighboring Dash's as he reached for the lock. "Feels like I should be asking you that," he said, glancing down as he entered the combination but looking up quickly mid-spin to cast a raised-eyebrow glance at the quarterback. "Seeing how you disappeared at the movies on Friday and haven't answered any of my texts or calls since?"

Ah, shit. Of course. Dash winced. "Yeah, sorry—I, uh, I lost my phone—"

"I just saw it in your hand, dude," Kwan cut him off, no malice in his voice despite catching the lie. "What gives? Is everything okay?"

 _No Paulina. No Kwan. No Starr. No one. Just us._

He slung his backpack more securely over his shoulder, and clapped a hand to Kwan's shoulder, nodding. "Everything's great," he assured him. "Just got a little tied up with something. No big."

Again, Kwan shot him sort of an odd look, before shrugging half-heartedly. "I mean, if you say so, dude. Powolski and I got to see the rest of the movies without you yammering on about what Fenton's deal is, so—that was nice."

Dash raised an eyebrow at him. "I didn't know you liked those movies."

Now Kwan shrugged again, but it was a little sheepish, if Dash didn't know any better. "I dunno," he admitted, grabbing the last book he needed from his locker before swinging it shut. "They're lame, yeah, but—weirdly entertaining."

Something in Dash's gut uncoiled slightly. His muscles relaxed a little, and it was a _strange_ sensation, but not unwelcome. "Huh," he hummed, as the duo turned to make their way to their first class. "Maybe I'll have to watch them, one of these days."

That halted Kwan in his tracks completely, and he blinked after Dash, who had stopped a few paces later. Kwan's dark eyebrows drew together. " _What?"_

Refusing to acknowledge the heat he could feel creeping up his neck, Dash shrugged again and hoped it appeared nonchalant. "I mean—they got good reviews, right? Tons of people like them. Hell, they're popular enough that there's like twenty volumes. Maybe it… wasn't cool of me to judge 'em so hard without ever actually _seeing_ one."

Kwan continued to blink at him for a moment before his frown deepened slightly and he resumed walking, albeit a bit slower than before. Almost hesitant. "Alright," he said finally, a few paces later, "who are you and what have you done with my best friend?"

Dash rolled his eyes. "Come on, Kwan—I'm not that much of a dick, am I?"

"No," Kwan agreed, "you're not. But the Dash Baxter I know would never _admit_ that."

Again, Dash simply shrugged slightly, not having a solid answer to explain his shifted mindset. He was about to respond when he felt his phone vibrate from his pocket again. Then it vibrated again. And again. His heart jumped and he looked down quickly, pulling it from his pocket. Next to him, Kwan frowned. "You okay? You look like you've seen a ghost." He paused, frowned, and crinkled his nose. "You know, that kinda loses its meaning a bit living here, doesn't it?"

Dash offered him a laugh, but slowed his pace nonetheless. "You know, I think I left my textbook in my locker," he excused himself, turning to Kwan and clapping him on the shoulder again. "I'll meet you there in a sec—save me a seat?"

Kwan gave him a dutiful two-finger salute before continuing on his way, while Dash turned and retreated back towards the direction of his locker. He pulled the phone from his pocket.

 _Ugh. Of course the fight they catch on the news is the first one in months that I was losing 90% of the time_

A smile tugged at Dash's mouth as he read the first text. His eyes drifted down to the second.

 _Minus Plasmius, of course. But I don't count that one_

And the third.

 _Still not proud of that, btw_

Dash laughed a little, barely hesitating at all before his fingers typed his own response and sent it on its merry way. His heart no longer hammered in his chest with worry.

 _First in months?_ he had written. _What about Freakshow_

By the time he'd made it back to his locker, Fenton had already replied.

 _Hey, just because I got hurt doesn't mean I lost. If it did I'd be in trouble_

 _If it did you'd be dead_

He sent the text without thinking. It wasn't until after the little _sent_ notification appeared under the words that he even realized what he'd said. Quickly, he sent another message, at his locker now with no real intention of opening it. The hallway was beginning to clear. Class was starting soon. He winced.

 _I didn't mean it like that_

A few agonizing seconds passed before he replied again.

 _Chill, dude_

 _If you can't make death jokes to a ghost, who can you make death jokes to?_

A slight pause.

 _Ok, maybe just ex-nay death jokes in the general public—but to us is fine_

Another pause, this one slightly longer.

 _Meet up with us for lunch?_

The corners of Dash's mouth quivered. _Sounds good,_ he replied. The hint of a smile he donned grew into a real one for only a moment before dropping from his face entirely, as the bell screamed shrilly overhead and indicated that he was, in fact, officially late for class.

* * *

"Whoa." Dash blinked at the trio as he found them, sitting under a secluded tree near the back of campus. "You look—"

"Like we were fighting a twenty-five-foot tall _dragon_ all night long?" Tucker filled in, raising the foil-wrapped burrito in his hand as if in a toast. "Spoiler alert."

Dash nodded a little numbly before sinking down to join them on the grass.

"You sure your reputation won't take a few blows from sitting with us?" Sam asked him, though where he was expecting heat in the words, he found… sarcasm. Almost as if she was _teasing_ him.

He tilted his head a little, exhaling. "Maybe my reputation could use a few blows," he said honestly, which earned him a small smile from the goth and—wow. Dash never thought he'd be that _relieved_ to be in her good graces. But he was.

He looked them over wearily. There was no sign of physical harm on Tucker or Sam, just impressively large bags under their eyes, drooping eyelids and clouds of exhaustion clinging to them. Fenton wasn't much worse for wear, just as tired as the other two, but with an impressive purple and black bruise darkened around one of his ice blue eyes, and what looked like already-scabbing-over talon marks traipsing down his neck and disappearing behind the collar of his shirt.

Dash nodded to him. "That's a hell of a shiner, Fenton."

And, despite the exhaustion in his entire countenance, his entire person, he grinned at the jock, his swollen eye closing a little more than its twin as he unwrapped a sub. "You should see the other guy."

Dash almost returned the smile. Almost. "How's your back?"

The grin he sported faded a bit into something more grateful, and he offered Dash a nod. "Good. Better."

"Just like that?"

Danny shrugged. "Just like that."

"The wondersh of 'upernatral healing," Tucker commented, around a bite of burrito.

Dash whistled. "Cool."

Sam handed Tucker a napkin, rolling her eyes a little as if, on cue, the burrito he held began falling apart in his hands. "Sure - until he gets so hurt even supernatural healing can't help."

Danny nodded at her, smiling a little as he snatched a chip from her open bag. "Thanks for the vote of confidence, Sam."

Tucker grunted, cupping one hand under the disassembled burrito, catching the falling filling. "She has a point, dude," he piped in, distractedly. "You can get kinda reckless."

Dash shrugged. "Point or not - still pretty cool."

Danny gestured grandly to Dash. " _Thank you._ At least someone believes in me."

"Of course he's gonna take your side, Danny. The guy worshipped the ground you walked on for nearly four years," Tucker laughed, before looking up and frowning, momentarily distracted from his crumbling lunch. "Flew...on? Hovered on?"

Dash felt the heat climb up his neck - either or, it was embarrassing to say the least. He winced. "I'm never living that down, am I?"

Sam grinned, then. She actually _grinned_ at him. "Never. It's only fair, Dash—considering how you used to treat us. I think a little tormenting is warrented."

And, well… it wasn't like he could argue that logic. He didn't even try, just nodded good-naturedly and said, "Touché." Then, he hesitated a little, the easy smile fading a little from his lips. "I'm sorry about that, by the way. Y'know—how I treated you. Both of you," he added, and gestured to Tucker as well, who was desperately trying to keep his lunch intact.

But the words made him look up again, and he exchanged a short glance with Sam before looking back to Dash. "An apology? From Dash Baxter?"

Dash shifted in his seat a little. "I mean—yeah. I'm not a complete jackass, you know. I'm…" He winced a little, eyebrows furrowing as he dropped his gaze a little. "I'm trying to be better."

There was a short pause, before Sam spoke up again. "Well I think apologies are a good way to start." Dash looked up, then, and met her gaze—something eased, something _honest_ in them. "Now you just gotta back your words up with actions," she added, quirking an eyebrow at him.

Dash nodded quickly in agreement. "I will."

She held his gaze for a moment more, her violet eyes intense, before allowing herself a nod and a small smile. "Good." She reached her arm out, offering him the bag she held. "Chip?"

"Careful," Danny warned, as Dash returned the smile and reached to take one. "They're all-natural, un-salted, baked kale chips. It's like eating grass."

"They're full of protein and _delicious,_ thank you very much."

Dash's hand froze, but only for a moment. He took one between his fingers, the green crisp notably dry in his hand. He shrugged a little, not eating it quite yet. "I'm trying this thing," he admitted, and his voice was a little quiet, "where I don't judge things until I give 'em a chance."

Then there was a hand on his shoulder, and when he looked over, it was Tucker—patting it gently as his shoulders shook in silent, short laughter. "Ah—it's your funeral, buddy."

Needless to say, Dash wouldn't be trying those chips again.

Spluttering and coughing, he gratefully accepted the water bottle Fenton held at the ready, gulping it down quickly to try and dislodge the _leaf taste_ in his mouth.

"Warned ya," he chuckled, followed by an easy shrug. "You'll learn to love them."

Tucker snorted. " _Or,"_ he countered, "you'll learn to avoid them at all costs. Like me."

"A vegetable or two isn't gonna kill you, Tucker," Sam teased, raising her eyebrows. "You know, that eighteen-year-old male metabolism of yours is gonna run out of miles sooner or later."

"And when that day comes, the issue will be addressed."

Sam rolled her eyes, popping another kale chip into her mouth.

Dash was a little shaken. Shaken that they were so—normal. It was a shame he never realized it sooner.

He was still marveling in the realization when something shifted in the air—to his left, Fenton stiffened noticeably, puffs of what appeared to be _blue breath_ wisping from his mouth as the temperature around them dropped an easy ten degrees. Dash felt his eyes go wide, leaning back on his hands and away from the bizarre show. Beside him, Tucker and Sam went tense simultaneously, sitting up a little straighter.

"Ah, great," Fenton sighed, seeming only mildly annoyed at the development, the sub he'd been attempting to eat frozen halfway to his mouth. He let it drop back to his makeshift tin-foil plate. "Wonder who it is this time?"

"Please not another dragon, please not another dragon," Tucker muttered as he rolled his unfinished burrito up in defeat before turning to rummage through his backpack.

Sam twisted a bracelet around on her wrist a few times, glancing up into the sky. "Skulker? He has a thing about showing up at school." Dash blinked again, because—did that bracelet just… sprout a gun?

"Nah," Tucker denied, pulling a silver and green PDA out from his bag. "Danny and I disassembled his suit on Saturday—no way is it up and running again. Not with the virus I planted in his baseline tech."

Dash blinked at them. Students to ghost fighters in an instant—already rising from their seats, eyes scanning the skies, weapons materializing out of seemingly nowhere whatsoever.

"Plasmius?" Danny suggested, and he looked battle-ready, but it was _odd,_ because it was him, Fenton, not Phantom, and his blue eyes were alert and focused, like they hadn't been sparkling with mischief and playfulness and _amusement_ just seconds ago.

Tucker, focus broken momentarily, blinked at the halfa. "You let him _out?"_ he hissed, gesturing generically and widely around them. " _Why?"_

Danny raised an eyebrow at his best friend, then, and the magic broke, that amusement there once again. "Tuck, I wasn't going to leave him trapped in there."

"Couldn't you at least _think_ about leaving him trapped in there?" the techno-geek pled. "I mean, what real reason was there to let him out, huh? I know, I know, _it's uncomfortable,_ okay, sure – but so is watching him hit on your mom, and he forces us to witness that any chance he gets."

Danny raised an eyebrow at him. "I'll remember that the next time you get shoved into a locker by one of the A-listers and want help getting out."

Tucker simply pulled a face at him, not dignifying it with a response.

Dash blinked at them again, and it suddenly made sense why _this_ was there go-to lunch spot. Under this tree, isolated, secluded from the rest of the students, the faculty—the entire campus. The wall of the building to their backs, a small patch of grass in front of them, branching off a minor sidewalk that was more like a trail than an actual sidewalk. It was the most private, most off-campus-area that was still _on campus._ There were no other students, no prying eyes to worry about if some ghost popped up that they had to deal with. And, judging by their reaction time, it happened a lot.

He was startled from thought when someone dropped something hard and cold in his lap. He narrowed his eyes, looking down and grabbing the object lightly, unsure, before looking up at the figure standing over him.

"You ever play Doomed?" Danny asked him, then snorted and shook his head before Dash even had the chance to answer. "Of course you haven't—you're Dash Baxter. What about Halo? Call of Duty?"

Dash glanced down at the weapon in his hands before rising to his feet shakily and swallowing. He nodded slowly, and glanced back to the halfa nervously.

Danny grinned, patting him on the back as a silver ring of light sparked into existence around his waist, emitting a coldness that Dash felt in his bones. "Cool," he continued on, as if nothing out of the ordinary were happening, the ring splitting in two and traveling over his body. "Then you're gonna be good at this. Same idea, just—point and shoot. Eventually you'll hit something." He paused. "Preferably not me."

Dash blinked at him again, and took note of everything he could. The white hair, the glowing green eyes, the icy hand on his shoulder. He nodded again, shifting the ecto-gun in his hands slightly, getting a better grip on it. The insignia on his chest seemed to glow silver with his own bizarre, unnatural power.

Another wisp of blue escaped Danny's lips, distracting him, and Dash nodded to it. "That some kind of… ghost sense?"

Though his eyes had returned to the air, Danny sent him another grin. "You catch on quick."

"Can you tell who it is?"

Danny shook his head. "Sometimes I can tell different ecto-signatures apart to see how many there are, but that's about it." He frowned, casting a look Foley's way. "Tuck? You getting a power level?"

Tucker, who had been furiously typing away on his PDA made some sort of motion of finality, making a final tap with a flourish. "And—wait for it…" he muttered, before the device pinged successfully. Tucker groaned. "Ah. Figures."

Sam quirked an eyebrow at him. "It's Plasmius, isn't it?"

"Not quite."

" _Beware!_ "

Sam and Danny's expressions fell flat, while Dash's gaze darted towards where the voice came from, floating somewhere over their heads. He's seen enough of Amity Park's ghost life to know immediately who it was, however that didn't stop him from raising the gun slightly upwards, scanning the sky for the small, blue ghost.

" _Bow before me, Ghost Child and Friends of Ghost Child,"_ a disembodied voice demanded, as the ghost shimmered into view. " _For I am the Box Ghost! And I am here to—_ wait, who is this guy?"

Dash's eyebrows shot up when he realized the ghost was speaking to him. Well, about him. His eyes widened a little, and he cast a glance towards where the trio now stood.

"Boxy, this is Dash," Danny said easily, gesturing to him. "Dash, the Box Ghost. Don't worry, he's harmless."

Dash blinked at the Box Ghost for a moment, who made no move but blinking right back at him. Then, as if catching on to what Danny had said, the Box Ghost sent him a glare. " _We will see who is harmless, Ghost Child, while you prepare yourself for your_ doom! _I have honored your request for a weekend of peace, but your time is up! My fury can wait no longer_!"

"Yeah, sure." Danny, who had all but crossed his legs while floating in mid-air, came to hover next to where Dash stood, still facing the Box Ghost. He nudged Dash with his elbow, and it sent shivers up his arm, made each and every hair stand on end. "Hey, Dash?" he asked, not moving his gaze from the ghost but tilting his head slightly in Dash's direction. "Care to do the honors?"

Okay, sure, he knew the big secret now. Sure, he knew that it all boiled down to him, a goofy teenager just trying to do the right thing. Sure, he knew that his opinions on Phantom had gotten thrown into a blender and made into something entirely new not even a week ago. But man—that didn't stop the wide grin from stretching across his face at his longtime-hero's suggestion. At the idea of helping his idol.

He had only shifted the gun he held slightly, however, when another blast, out of nowhere, shot the Box Ghost fifty yards away and crashing into a light post by the sidewalk.

Danny blinked at where the ghost had been, eyes wide. As if taking a moment to ponder something, he finally nodded, looking impressed. "Nice hit."

Dash felt his eyebrows draw together. "That… wasn't me."

Once again, Danny's ghost sense went off.

He melted out of the comfortable position, barely touching down to the ground but in a much more battle-ready position than the last, nonetheless. "Ah, crud."

"Working on it," Tucker called from a few paces away, typing furiously on his PDA.

Danny, though, just looked tired. "Don't bother," he sighed. When Tucker looked up, Danny nodded to a small, black shape in the distance rapidly getting larger and larger. Closer.

Dash's stomach sank as he realized who it was. He swallowed. "He's gonna kill me."

Danny rolled his eyes. "He's not going to _kill you,"_ he insisted.

"He _might_ kill him."

Danny's green gaze shot to his best friend's. "Tucker."

The techno-geek smiled wryly. "Kidding."

"Daniel!"

The voice came from above them. Dash looked up, startled, heart pounding in his ears. Angry red eyes glared down at them, framed by inhuman, blue skin and what seemed like crackling pink electricity.

"Releasing me into the captivity of the Guys in White? You're a lot of things, boy—but I never took you for a _coward."_ The words were hissed out, not much more than a sneer of resentment. He turned his attention to Dash, now, who's heart nearly leapt from his chest. "And _you!_ Think you can get away with trapping me in one of those idiotic Thermoses _,_ do you?"

Before he could squeak out a word, Phantom was rising higher into the air, meeting the ghost at eye-level. "You did kind of deserve it, Plasmius," he commented lightly. "Besides—you wanna talk about being a coward? Attacking me from behind? _Really,_ Vlad?"

Plasmius grit his sharp, pointed teeth together. "I have worked too hard for a couple of meddling children to stand in my way."

From the air above them, Phantom grinned. Amusement seemed to _spark_ in his green eyes. "And yet, here we are—foiling your plans yet again. Also," he added as an afterthought, "and you know, I hate to break this to you, fruitloop—we're _legally adults,_ now. But, hey. That must make your ego feel a bit better, right? At least you're not getting thrown around by a couple of fourteen-year-olds, anymore."

Before Dash could blink, a flash of pink energy cracked through the air and sent Danny plummeting to the sidewalk. For a moment, he had flashbacks of the other night—the shock of pink, the hero shooting toward the ground like a bullet, guaranteeing more than a few broken bones on impact…

But Danny disappeared into the ground, reemerging behind Plasmius with a snort of laughter, unharmed and whole. His eyes were amused, even behind the ugly bruise. "Okay—I kinda deserved that one. Kudos."

With a growl, Plasmius spun on his metaphoric heel in the sky to face him, shooting off another blast of energy. It crackled through the air, sending an odd rush of icy wind over them. "You are determined to test my patience as far as you can, aren't you, Daniel?"

Danny shrugged, and then there was excited green energy dancing around his hands, engulfing them, pulsating with power that he easily formed into a shield to block the other ghost's blast. "Stop tormenting people and maybe I'll give you a break, cheesehead." The shield cracked on impact, but seemed to absorb the attack, the energy of it, as if Plasmius's power infused his. He let it shatter, the shards of green-and-pink ecto-energy suddenly shooting through the air like knives towards Plasmius.

Still, the blue-tinged ghost merely steamed with his anger, calling up his own round, almost spherical shield to protect him against the attack. "Soon," he promised, and smiled a little, his shield dissipating into wisps once the shards had faded away. His smile turned hungry, like a vulture spotting its prey. "Soon, Little Badger. You'll realize there's only one winning side, son—and you're not on it."

"Okay, one? Not your son. I'll send my dad your regards, though." He raised an eyebrow at him. "Two? Pretty sure the winning side is whichever side you're _not on._ So… thanks, but no thanks."

Plasmius charged him, then, grabbing him by the mere fabric of his jumpsuit and shaking him, faces close, anger radiating off him. "You insolent _child—_ you don't understand _anything."_

Danny tried to shake him off, to no avail. "Told you," he grunted, finally landing a knee into Plasmius' gut hard enough to make him lose his grip. "Not technically a _child_." He used Plasmius' momentary lapse to twist himself out of his grasp before delivering an ecto-blast-ready fist into his chin and sending him spiraling. "Insolent, on the other hand?" he exhaled, and laughed breathily. "Eh. Debatable. Only to you, though, V-Man."

" _Daniel—"_

"Do you actually _have_ an evil plan, Vlad?" Danny interrupted him, while his red eyes blazed furiously as he steadied himself once more. "Because honestly, I'm not really getting what you're trying to accomplish, here. Are you trying to… take over the world again? Take over Amity Park? Hell—steal my mom away from my dad? Not that that would _work,"_ he added, raising his eyebrows, "of course, seeing how you're _evil_ and my mom hates you. And is completely in love with my father. In case you forgot."

Vlad's hands tightened into angry fists at his sides, pulsing with angry energy. "Your _father_ is a blithering, bumbling buffoon."

Danny shrugged. "Sure. But he's the buffoon my mom chose over you. So really, what's that say about _you,_ fruitloop?"

Another fork of pink ecto-energy cracked towards Danny, this time hitting him square in the chest and knocking him into the air. Beside Dash, Tucker and Sam aimed their weapons at Plasmius, waiting for the best moment to strike. Dash followed their lead, lifting the ecto-gun he held in his white-knuckled grip.

"Okay, _ow."_ Phantom reappeared closer to them, and the front of his suit was singed a bit, revealing blistering skin underneath. Dash didn't focus on how the blisters were green instead of the usual reddish-pink. Phantom touched them gently before looking back up at Plasmius, huffing. "So you're not in the mood for banter today. Got it. And, for the record, the only people allowed to call Dad a buffoon are me, Jazz, and Mom." He emphasized his point with a flash of green, an ecto-blast, bright and solid and strong, that sent Vlad tittering backwards.

Beside Dash, another flare of green shot from the ground and hit Plasmius in the shoulder. He looked over, noticing a smirk on Sam's face while she held her aim steady, wrist ray already charging up with another attack. Plasmius gripped at his shoulder, growling down at them. The blast, smaller than Danny's had been, seemed to catch him off guard. It actually seemed to _stagger_ him.

"Man," Sam commented, and twisted a small ring that sat on the butt of the miniature gun. "I am _loving_ these new Wrist Rays, Tucker. You and the Fentons really came through."

Tucker allowed himself a smile, adjusting his glasses proudly and pretending to buff his nails on his shirt, all the while keeping one hand steady with an ecto-gun of his own. "Oh, you know—some recalculated baseline electrostatic configuration mixed with some killer ectoradiation calibration and electrochemical enhancers, for fun. Those babies oughta react to ectoplasm just as much as Spector Deflectors—and do at least double the damage, too."

Sam grinned, shooting at Plasmius again, catching him in the chest this time with a small grunt of pain. Where the blast hit, Dash could see small electric shocks blossoming and webbing out, across his body. If he blinked, he would've missed it.

Plasmius grunted again through the blast, cringing in on himself tensely as he lost even more altitude. He was practically on his feet, now, instead of hovering above their heads. It still wasn't enough to deter him, though, and when he glanced up at the four again, his teeth were bared, glinting sharply in the sun and with the reflection of his own ghostly glow. His red eyes were murderous.

"You're losing your touch, old man," Danny taunted, and clicked his tongue at the ghost ahead of them. "C'mon, it's no fun if you don't throw it back at us. What, are two little ectoblasts all it takes to take you down, now?"

And the next thing he knew, Danny's throat was in Vlad's fists, twenty feet above ground, pinned to the brick wall of Casper High.

Dash's heart hammered in his ears as, in unison, the three of them sprang forward, weapons drawn and aimed. Above them, Plasmius shook Danny, slamming him into the wall, his head impacting with an audible _crack._

The only sound of pain came in the form of a strangled noise, from somewhere in the back of Danny's throat. If Dash didn't know any better, he'd say it was akin to a growl. There was a bright flash of green, and Dash had to look away, temporarily blinded, ectogun shaking in his hand.

" _Tuck!_ " The word wasn't more than a grunt. Dash blinked the stars out of his eyes and looked back up again, where Danny now had one arm buried in the fabric of Plasmius's cape, using it to pull the other ghost away from him. His other hand enveloped in blue, and he grabbed on to where Plasmius still held him by the throat. "Thermos!"

Before Tucker could make a move for it, though, there were laser-like ectoblasts raining down on them. Three more Plasmiuses had appeared, just above their heads.

Tucker and Sam, without hesitation, began firing at them. Jumping over each other and maneuvering around powerful blasts without a breath. Old pros.

Dash's breath shuddered, but he clenched his jaw as his gaze found the third duplicate. "Just point and shoot," he exhaled unevenly, and pulled on the trigger.

He missed his target by about five feet. The duplicate barked out a laugh, lifting a glowing hand in Dash's direction. He was never more grateful for all the 13-hour training days with the football team than that instant, his reflexes taking over when his mind stopped short, leaping to the side the same moment a crack of pink ecto-energy shot towards him, leaving a spiderweb of cracks in the pavement where he'd stood.

Dash pushed himself back to his feet quickly, letting off another blast from his ecto-gun without much thought. Another miss.

The Plasmius duplicate laughed again. "You're the one that trapped me in that blasted soup thermos," he noted, and smirked at the jock. "You're going to pay for that."

He came closer, quickly, fire in his red eyes. Narrowing his own eyes at the smirking ghost, he took another shot—this one steadier, more confident. It hit him square in the forehead, and the Plasmius duplicate practically dissolved into wisps instantaneously.

He blinked at the now empty air for a moment, his heart still hammering loudly in his ears. He… did it. He actually _did it._ Sorta. It wasn't a real ghost, just a duplicate, but… still. A small smile tugged at his mouth. It was just a lucky shot, but _man_ was it cool.

Tucker and Sam were still fighting, and above their heads, Danny and Plasmius were a whirlwind of black and red, of green flares and magenta electricity. He spun on his heel, looking back towards the tree they had been sitting at not ten minutes ago, eating lunch. The Thermos had to be _somewhere._

He checked Danny's bag first, the one he had with him that same night so many secrets ago. There was a small green stain on the bottom of it, that he hadn't noticed before. But there was nothing of use inside, and no Thermos to be seen—just crumpled, incomplete homework, a copy of _Invisible Man_ with a torn binding, and a restocked first-aid kit.

He reached for Tucker's bag next, and as he lifted it, the desired Thermos nearly fell out on its own—the rest of the bag so full of wires and electronic devices, what appeared to be both complete and incomplete, the thermos had been resting on top precariously. He blinked at the contents again. Everything inside had the same silver and green paneling that the Thermos he now held in his hands did. Ghost-tech.

He gripped it tighter, and rose again to his feet, resting the bag back down as he did. Tucker and Sam had gotten rid of the other duplicates, and were now aimed and ready to put up a united front again Plasmius with Danny, gazes and weapons lifted. Above them, Danny now had a split lip to accompany his preexisting injuries, but didn't seem any more injured than that. Tucker's beret was askew on his head, a small trickle of blood rolling down his left cheek from a small gash there. Dark bruises were already forming on Sam's exposed, pale arm.

Dash swallowed, passing the Thermos off to Tucker as he joined them, watching the final Plasmius, the real one, with wide eyes. He was still too far up for them to do anything, too high in the air. And too close to Danny. If they tried to capture him now, there wasn't a doubt in his mind that they'd get Danny too.

Taking note of the arrival of the Thermos, Sam, still aiming her Wrist Ray towards them with one hand, cupped the other one around her mouth as she called, " _Now,_ Danny!"

From above, there was a flash of green, and the two figures broke apart from each other, followed closely by a shock of cold and a flash of glacier-blue light—and, before he knew it, Plasmius was falling rapidly towards the ground, encased entirely in ice.

Beside him, Tucker aimed the thermos and uncapped it, catching the falling figure in the blue beam of light before he even had a chance to thaw out. Everything seemed to slow down, as Plasmius was engulfed by the light. For a second he simply froze there, mid-fall, until the beam started to _pull_ him in, just as it had for Dash a few nights ago. And within seconds, the light faded, and everything went quiet. Plasmius was, once again, trapped.

Dash blinked for a moment, before lifting his hands in a show of innocence. He glanced at Tucker. "It wasn't me this time. Next time he comes back for revenge, you're taking the fall."

Tucker considered the words as Danny floated back down towards them on the ground. He tightened the lid on the Thermos, and pressed a switch on the side that Dash assumed was a containment lock of some sort. He raised his eyebrows slightly. "I'd consider it more of a group effort, honestly."

Phantom touched down to the ground in a brief flash of light, leaving Danny Fenton once more, whole and human. "You guys alright?"

From Dash's other side, Sam snorted. "Oh, yeah. I love being attacked by billionaire psychopaths."

The halfa cracked a smile. "Keeps you on your toes, at least." Tucker handed him the Thermos, and he regarded it for a moment. He nodded. "I think you were right, Tuck," he admitted finally. "Should've left him in there a bit longer. Let him stew in his bitterness."

"Y'know, I kinda feel bad for the guy," Tucker admitted, and they turned back to where their lunches still sat, abandoned under the tree. "I mean, he hasn't been able to catch a break in almost four _years._ With us thwarting all his evil plans, and everything."

"And yet he still comes back for more," Sam sighed, and they sank down to the lawn once more. She picked up her bag of kale chips, popping one into her mouth in contemplation. "I wonder what he's up to, this time around."

Danny sighed too, shaking his head. "I don't know, but it can't be anything good."

Dash's heart was still hammering slightly in his ears. He still had a vice-like grip on the weapon, his eyes wide and alert. Danny glanced at him, half-eaten sub frozen halfway to his mouth. "Dash? You good?"

The jock blinked at him, and swallowed back the lump in his throat. But it wasn't _fear,_ necessarily, that he was feeling. It was more like… exhilaration. Adrenaline. He nodded. "Yeah," he assured, and nodded. "Yeah. Good. That was just—" he broke off, and a smile tugged at his lips as he felt his grip loosen. "—kinda cool. Terrifying," he added quickly, and handed the gun back to Danny, "but cool."

But the halfa shook his head, grinning. "Hang on to that. You never know when it'll come in handy."

Dash blinked, and dropped his gaze to the ectogun. "I can't—I can't just carry a weapon around with me. What if someone finds it?"

Danny rolled his eyes and took a bite of his sandwich, while Tucker raised his eyebrows. "We live in _Amity Park,_ dude. I'm surprised they haven't mandated that _everyone_ carry some kinda ecto-weapon around. Besides," he added with a shrug, "it's not like they hurt _humans._ Just ghosts. They're not dangerous."

Dash glanced down at the gun again, before smiling and nodding and sliding it carefully into his own backpack. "Yeah," he said lightly, "yeah, okay."

They ate in silence for a moment longer, until, once again, Danny's ghost sense went off. He groaned, closing his eyes momentarily and dropping his sub again to his tin foil plate. "You've gotta be kidding me."

 _"_ _Beware!"_

The voice, once again, had no body attached to it. Without even rising from his seat, Danny glared into the air, searching. "Hey, Box Ghost!" he called. "C'mon, where are you?"

The small blue ghost materialized ahead of them, not far from the tree he'd been blasted into only moments ago. " _Fear me, Ghost Child and friends of Ghost Child!"_

"Terrifying," Sam remarked dryly, and popped a final kale chip into her mouth. She crumpled her paper bag loudly.

"Hey, yeah, look," Danny started, still not rising from his seat. He glanced at his phone. "Boxy, we have like sevem minutes left to eat lunch before English. Do you think we could do this later? After school? Like three-ish?"

The Box Ghost drifted closer, his arms held high in an effort to make himself larger, more menacing. " _I am the Box Ghost, and I do not accept this request! My fury—"_

 _"_ —can wait no longer," Danny finished, rolling his eyes, "yeah, we got that. Come here, for a sec?"

The Box Ghost blinked. He watched Danny, unmoving for a while, before slowly, cautiously drifting forward. Closer.

Danny lifted the Thermos. "Two options, okay? One, you can leave me and my friends to finish our lunch in peace and come back around three-ish, when I will be more than happy to deal with you and your fury," he began, and shook the Thermos slightly. "Or I can lock you in here with cheesehead for the next four days or so and _then_ face your fury. It's up to you."

The Box Ghost blinked at the halfa, gaze drifting to the Thermos he still held up. Angered and frustrated, he waved his fists around. " _I am the Box Ghost,"_ he repeated, " _and I will grant you your wish of a peaceful lunchtime break! But prepare yourself, for you will have no choice but to face my fury at three-ish, after school!"_

Danny smiled, setting the Thermos back down in satisfaction. "Have a nice day, Box Ghost."

The blue ghost muttered something under his breath, before vanishing from sight. Dash glanced at Danny, who simply shrugged. "Told you. He's harmless. Big bark, virtually no bite whatsoever."

"Fair enough." Dash's gaze landed on the Thermos again, for a moment, and he nodded to it. "Hey, what're the other two places?" he asked suddenly.

Danny frowned at him, eyebrows drawing together. "What?"

Dash tapped the Thermos. "On Friday, you said if you had to make a list of the top five places you never wanted to go again, the Thermos would be three, four and five. What about the other two?"

They all seemed to contemplate the question, the group falling silent in thought. After a moment, Danny dropped his gaze slightly, a frown still on his face. There was something odd in his eyes, something dark. "Two would be an… alternate timeline where everyone I cared about was killed and I turned into the most powerful and malevolent ghost on the face of the planet?"

Dash blinked. "Jesus." Maybe he shouldn't've asked. He almost regretted it, seeing that look in his eyes. On some level, he knew—it wasn't always as easy as rescheduling the Box Ghost's fury, but… it was still jarring to hear. To be reminded. That they've dealt with… serious things. Life-or-death things. Traumatic things. He almost didn't want him to continue, didn't want to know what could top the list. But curiosity got the best of him, and he pressed forward. "And number one?"

But then Danny cracked a smile at him and there was light in his eyes again, humor and amusement as he regarded Dash with a raised eyebrow. The darkness gone in a flash. "Your gym locker," he admitted with a laugh. "I mean, _seriously,_ dude—do you ever wash your dirty socks?"

Dash hesitated slightly before cracking his own smile, his own laugh. Because _that,_ that right there, was the truly extraordinary thing, about all of this. It wasn't what the three of them have done, it wasn't what they've faced, what they've been up against. It wasn't what they've endured, what they've beaten back into the depths of hell itself. It was the fact that after all of that, after everything they've seen, they were good humored, and lively, and that they've seen truly dark and horrible things, but could still have light in their eyes like Danny, and joke like Tucker, and be strong-willed and fierce like Sam.

That they could look beyond all the terrible things he'd done to them, and treat him like an ally. Like a friend. It was the first time Dash had _genuinely good_ people around him in… a long time.

He suppressed a smile, glancing down at his still uneaten lunch for a moment before tilting his head slightly. "Y'know, I'll deny it if it gets around that I've said it, but you guys are… kinda cool. In your own nerd way, of course."

Almost in unison, Tucker put a hand over his heart, and Sam lifted a hand to her head and leaned into Danny's shoulder, as if fainting. Danny just grinned. "A compliment from Dash Baxter," he acknowledged with a nod. "Wow. Life fulfilled."

Dash rolled his eyes. "You're welcome. Now you can die happy."

"Happy and—" he was cut off by the bell, and his shoulders slumped. "—starving," he finished, and glanced down at his barely-eaten lunch in defeat. "Ah, one of these days."

Dash raised his eyebrows inquisitively, and Sam snorted as she pulled her trash together into what looked like a small, green, biodegradable bag with a cartoon of a smiling Earth in the center. "The ghosts have Danny's schedule down pat," she explained. "Haven't finished a lunch properly in well over a year."

Tucker clapped him on the shoulder as Dash glanced down at his own barely-touched food. "I'd start eating a big breakfast, if I were you," he advised. "And bringing snacks for the classroom. If you're eating lunch with us, you're probably not eating much."

Dash nodded, gathering his own forgotten lunch together. "Noted. Anything else?"

"You're probably gonna get kidnapped at some point or another," Sam put in, but shrugged nonetheless. "It usually works itself out."

Dash's eyes widened. " _What?_ "

Beside him, the halfa laughed. "Welcome to Team Phantom," Danny joked with a grin, and nodded towards the school. "Come on, we have English."


End file.
